


The End of Time

by Jaelijn



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - Croatoan/Endverse, Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode: s05e04 The End, F/M, Gen, Hurt Castiel, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, M/M, Recreational Drug Use, Spoilers for Episode: s05e19 Hammer of the Gods, Spoilers for Episode: s05e23 Swan Song, Spoilers for all of S5 really
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-13
Updated: 2015-05-13
Packaged: 2018-03-30 09:39:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 29
Words: 33,937
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3932035
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jaelijn/pseuds/Jaelijn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>So Lucifer found his true vessel - good for him! But did he really have to go and kill all the pagan gods? Gabriel sets out to end this apocalypse as soon as possible, but when he falls in with Castiel and Dean, destiny might not go as planned. (Endverse!AU)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Creation

**Author's Note:**

> Hello all! Welcome to my Gabriel Big Bang! This has been in the works for a long time, happy to finally share it!
> 
> As you've seen from the tags, this is quite heavy on the endverse-angst, and Gabriel's inclusion hasn't really allowed me to give a cheery spin on things. Hope those of you who have found their way here are up for it! There are references to past Gabriel/Kali, as well as an undercurrent of (endverse-ly unhappy) Dean/Cas, though nothing explicit happens "on screen". There are also reference to casual sleeping around, but again, nothing explicit. The focus is on Gabe and Cas. Since this is endverse, there is little Sam. 
> 
> I'll put something re: the major character death in the endnotes, but be warned, it is spoilery. 
> 
> Finally, a thousand thanks to my beta, [supernaturalis](http://archiveofourown.org/users/supernaturalis/works), who put up with my fairly unedited and a touch confusing first draft and made it perfect! Thanks!

**Act 1**

**Scene 1 - Creation**

They were all gone – dead, even though they should have existed forever. They had been wiped out, every last one of them. He had known they would be if they decided to meddle in this. He’d been too late to do anything about it. All he could do was walk in the bloody shadow of the Morningstar, as, bar the blood, he had _always_ done, and wonder if it would hurt less if it had been Michael.

Most of Father’s little soldiers wouldn’t understand, of course. He loved them as kin, as siblings, but they had no understanding of affections, feelings, even sympathies. Lucifer had Fallen, and that had been that for them.

Gabriel, of course, was different. He’d always been different, even compared to the other archangels, which was why he was standing here, in the carnage the Devil had left behind, and was not sitting in the clouds playing his horn to Michael’s tunes. If only they had invited him, or he had found out earlier, he might have been able to talk them out of this folly! He had been one of them, after all! But of course Odin had no interest in ever informing ‘Loki’ of anything he did (nor had he even noticed that the real Loki had become toast centuries ago), and Kali… Ah, Kali. It was such a shame.

Gabriel made sure that there was nothing left for unwitting humans to stumble across. Of course, that hadn’t mattered to Lucifer – he had always been so uninterested in Father’s pet project. If the sight before him now was anything to go by, he was getting his wish finally. Gabriel didn’t agree with him, per se – after all, he had come to appreciate the finer things that came with living amongst humans, such as sweets, fun and sex. He was a trickster! It wasn’t much fun to be a trickster with no one around to appreciate the humor. At least Heaven never took notice of his meddling – the dicks he went after were bound to Hell, anyway, and Hell was an account keeper’s nightmare. No one really was keeping a tally, or at least no one had as long as Lucifer had been locked away. The time for tricks was over, anyway.

Gabriel erected a monument where the carnage had been – bending reality had always been his forte, and hey, it wasn’t exactly complicated. Just something impressive and fitting, and soon enough none of humans would have time to worry about a new volcano in Iceland, anyway. Not like there weren’t enough already. Gabriel wasn’t sure if all of the ancient gods he was laying to rest would have approved of a volcano as monument, but they weren’t coming back to haunt him about it. No afterlife for gods and angels.

Gabriel was surprised, to be honest, that both the vessels hadn’t caved yet. Dean was a stubborn ass with a decent enough sense of humor up until you put his patience to a test, even if sometime a touch too black and white for Gabriel’s taste. He’d have thought that after Hell, he’d be eager for a chance to kill the Devil and get redemption. He’d have though that Sam would be the one to hold out longer, after all he’d made it through a year in Gabriel’s pocket universe, all set on one single-minded quest for revenge – but perhaps Lucifer’s promises had been too much for the boy with the demon blood and a judgmental, self-destructive brother. Luci had always been good at smooth talking.

Gabriel had no intention to return to Heaven. He wanted nothing to do with Michael and his ilk, no more than he would go running to Lucifer. He really couldn’t have cared less, he just wanted this stupid squabble to be over, and if they had to blow up the world to finally finish it, so be it. He’d just carve out a place for himself in some other reality. It was something he’d gotten really good at, anyway. He’d thought that something along the lines of a TV land might be fun for a few centuries, though he supposed that, if Luci should win this thing, he’d have to stay out of his way with that idea. Certainly didn’t look as though Dad did plan on coming back and saving his precious creation, and as long as Michael didn’t have a vessel, well…

That was really odd. Gabriel supposed he could zap across the world and try to badger some sense into the other Winchester, just to screw over Lucifer for killing his _friends_. But hey, Michael would have done the same if he’d had forces to spare. Gabriel had sensed the sentinels striding through the carnage to make their report, and had waited them out before he’d approached. He had no energy left to grieve. Michael and Lucifer’s constant squabbling for _centuries_ before Lucifer had finally Fallen had driven that out of him.

The fastest way to get it over and done with was to get Michael his vessel, but Gabriel hesitated. There was… a screwball in the system, an oddness he found hard to predict. He’d heard whispers, mostly, individual angels and garrisons talking amongst themselves, even some humans who’d witnessed… well, what had it been? A resurrection? A miracle? Gabriel didn’t think there was anyone still around to work miracles, not counting himself, of course, and he doubted that anyone of the other archangels had done it. Raphael had even done the killing, as far as he’d heard. Raphael had always been a bit of a humorless dick.

Gabriel remembered Castiel, of course. His memory was always accurate, of course, but this kind came with the special brand of not wanting to remember, like everything concerning his family. Castiel had been so young by Gabriel’s standard, just a seraph, barely more than a fledgling in his eyes. He didn’t like to dwell on anything else he connected with the angel, but perhaps the answer was to be found there – the answer as to why Castiel’s cry after he’d raised Dean from perdition had nearly shattered his eardrums, and right in the middle of a very enjoyable feast, as well, and as to why Castiel had rebelled and died all for the humans who were bound to let him down.

Humans were a mess, Gabriel knew, and while he found them an endless source of amusement and entertainment, he’d always preferred his own replicas to the real thing. Too much hassle, too dangerous for supernatural beings, yadayadayada. He had no idea what a mere seraph, a soldier, saw in the vessels that made him stand against the people who wanted to lead them to their purpose. Not that he’d been particularly successful.

Chicago and Detroit were a mess, millions dead, Lucifer had his true vessel, and already there were reports of epidemics of a new, strange sickness. Still, Dean Winchester hadn’t said yes. Yet.

As of now, Raphael was holding the lines for Michael, and he really wasn’t the type for it. Raphael was the kind of commander who sat in a white tent on the hill, directing the battle. He wasn’t the kind who fought in the front line. That was Michael’s job, but he had always been so picky about vessels. Something he shared with the Morningstar, in fact, not that either of them would ever admit to having anything in common – though, Lucifer might. He always liked to harp on about their special bond.

Gabriel shook off his musings, and conjured a chocolate bar. It was comfort food, but there was no one around to judge anyway. Not anymore. It was time he did something to speed this mess to its inevitable end.

 

Dean Winchester was easy enough to find. He might be hidden from angels, but his angelic companion wasn’t. He might attempt to conceal his presence, but Gabriel had felt his composure slip before. Not even an angel could be on alert all the time, especially not when he was cut off from the Host. Gabriel was very glad that hadn’t happened to him. He was an archangel, so he could disappear off the Host’s radar whenever he wanted, but the search had stopped a while ago. They all believed he was dead, now, which suited him just fine.

Castiel wasn’t so lucky. He was an outcast. Not Fallen – that wasn’t it. There had never been a thing like Castiel before, though Gabriel supposed that, had the Host known about him, he’d have been Castiel’s precursor. He would have hated that. His powers just… draining away? Hells no. His powers had made his existence bearable all these years. Even fun.

Castiel really was trying so hard to remain hidden, but every now and again, his anguish would flare sharply, noisily, before he managed to smother it again. Gabriel hadn’t known that it was possible for an angel to feel that deeply when there was no physical injury. Mental anguish wasn’t angelic. But then, Castiel had never really been _normal_.

 

_“What are you doing, brother? Fraternizing with the lower tiers?”_

_“I am_ educating _the young, Gabriel, as should you.”_

_Gabriel eyed Raphael sideways. “I think Father forgot to introduce_ you _to the concept of jokes.”_

_“What are you referring to?”_

_“You call this an education?” Gabriel gestured at the swarm of seraphs who had been listening with rapt attention, soaking up every word Raphael said and taking it for Holy Truth. They were assimilating, not learning._

_Raphael, as ever, did not see the problem. “Yes. They were listening, before you interrupted us.”_

_“Yes, listening. Soldiers, lapping up your every word.”_

_“It’s what they are, Gabriel.”_

_“Then don’t call it educating. Call it drill, instruction.”_

_Raphael breathed his long-suffering sigh, perfected through Gabriel’s presence, he was sure. He never got around to his tirade. “No! Castiel! Refrain!”_

_The seraph’s grace flickered, startled, then flared up in defiance. He didn’t stop, but continued to approach the Heavenly borders, where the veil to reality was thinnest – where you could catch glimpses of their Father’s creation, where the Garden was, where all of Father’s beings waited for their time to be released to Earth._

_Gabriel went after the seraph, ignoring Raphael’s anger. “Castiel.”_

_The seraph was a silent presence. He remained alert, but he did not seem to perceive Gabriel as a threat. His focus was on Earth, the new planet just visible from here. Any closer, and they would have to fly. “It is beautiful,” Castiel said._

_“Just wait until there’s life.”_

_Castiel’s wings, dark and solemn shadows, rose with interest. “Life?”_

“Cas, what the hell?!”

Castiel glared at Dean. The noise wasn’t agreeable. Dean’s soul shone too bright, glaring, and the human sounds were grating. Heartbeat, movement, and voice, most of all.

“What happened to you? You’re drunk!”

For a fleeting moment, Castiel wanted to tell Dean to go away in no uncertain terms. He refrained. “Yes.”

Being drunk wasn’t a wholly pleasant sensation. Castiel found that it dulled the aching confusion left by the unsuccessfulness of his search, and his increasing irritation with his vessel. Ever since he had lost Jimmy’s soul, Castiel found the body confining and limited, and human means of communication imprecise and irritating. However, the alcohol also made him less inclined to engage with his charge, especially since Dean’s affronted expression struck him as highly hypocritical. “I was of the impression that it was a means of _coping_.”

“I… fuck, Cas, you’re an angel!”

Castiel had noticed that, too – that Dean had started swearing more openly and frequently since _it_ had happened. _It_ being the day that Lucifer had taken Sam Winchester for his vessel. Castiel couldn’t be sure how much of Sam was still alive, and he wondered daily if he should have – could have – prevented it. Then, he had had to worry about staying alive, about fighting off the Host, keeping an eye on his charge. He wondered now if he should have kept an eye on Sam, as well, if he should have insisted that the brothers reunite. The alcohol had made that guilt go away, as well, leaving only irritation. At Dean, mostly.

“A poor example of one,” he muttered, leaning against the room divider. He shouldn’t have come, but he had never been able to ignore Dean’s calls. It wasn’t like he had anywhere else to be, either.

“Sit down! You’re not used to this.” Dean grasped him by the elbow and pulled him over to the lumpy motel couch. Ordinarily, Castiel would have objected to the manhandling, but now he couldn’t find it in him to care. He let his vessel’s head fall back against the upholstery and closed his eyes. His grace painted ethereal patterns against the back of his vessel’s eyelids.

“How did this happen, anyway?”

“I found a liquor store.”

“And what? Just took emptied a couple of bottles right of the shelves?”

“I emptied the shelves.”

Dean passed his hand through his hair, whistling lowly through his teeth. “Okay.”

“How do you do it, Dean?”

“Do what?”

Castiel’s first impulse was to say _live_ , but he was not governed by impulses. He was still an angel, draining grace or not. He was still on the right path – or was he? There was no guidance. Castiel no longer believed that the Heavenly orders were right, no more than Lucifer’s were, but sometimes he still had questions, doubts. Who was he to decide what was right and wrong? Who was he to choose a course of action? Who was he to _tell Dean_ what to do? Dean, who had always been so sure, so determined to go his own way, whose soul was the brightest and most beautiful Castiel had ever seen – Dean, who had been miserable since _it_ had happened, but yet had not given in, had not yet said yes to Michael. Castiel had underestimated him, and he was being unfair. Dean was merely human. The weight he carried had to seem enormous, and he couldn’t expect him to give Castiel instructions or answers when he had none.

So, Castiel said: “I’m not accustomed to this lack of direction.”

“Yeah, well. It’s not like God is going to show up any time soon. You and me, Cas, that’s all we got.” There was a sharp, biting tone to Dean’s voice.

“Dean…”

“Look.” Dean started rummaging around in his duffel. “Dead-beat dads. I get it. Catch.” He tossed Castiel a small bottle of pills. “You’re going to need those later. For the headache.”

Castiel squinted down at the bottle. It said easily in his palm, the pills rattling around inside, just visible through the orange plastic. “How many should I take?”

Dean gave a careless shrug. “You? Probably down the whole bottle.”

The label read ‘take one every three hours’, but he was an angel.

The day had started out ordinarily enough. Dean had checked in, just a quick prayer, to let Castiel know how things were. Dean never talked about personal issues in those prayers – he just let Castiel know when he needed him. Today, he had – there had been strange occurrences in a small village nearby, almost military grade shut-down, piles of bodies. It looked like civil war.

As soon as Castiel realized the bodies were abandoned demon vessels, he knew that it had been the Whore, trying to condemn the whole town to Hell. Lucifer must have freed her, or maybe she just escaped during his rise. By the time Dean and Cas had gotten into the town, everyone was dead. Men, women, children. So many children. There was no sign of angelic or divine interference. The place stunk of demon, but there was no sign of the Whore, either. This had been allowed to happen. It was then that Castiel had gone away to get drunk.

It had been an irrational decision, one that had no greater purpose other than that Castiel hadn’t been able to witness the carnage of an innocent town damned any longer and had wanted to forget. To wash the images from his mind. Not that he could. He was an angel. He didn’t forget. Alcohol was a human remedy.

Castiel twisted the pill bottle in his hand. He had wanted to smite the demons responsible, but he knew that he no longer could. Squashing this bottle instead seemed childish and petty. Human. “I remember…”

“Hm?” Dean glanced up from his own glass of whiskey.

“I remember being first told of my Father’s plans for this planet. For Earth. I remember…” Castiel shook his head, and never finished his sentence out loud.

 

_I remember standing in the border regions of Heaven, where it takes only a step to cross into the mortal plain,_ this _plane, only a step to Fall – I remember standing there and looking down upon Earth and thinking how beautiful it was. It was only a rock, then, Dean, just cooling down, but even then I could see where the sea would be, the landmass, and I found it beautiful. I remember a brother stepping up to me, and telling me for the first time of our Father’s plan. Life. This rock, this planet, would one day be filled with life. I didn’t understand. Angels exist, they don’t_ live _. Mortality was a foreign concept, completely alien to me. I knew that I could… cease to exists, that my being could be discontinued, if our Father wished, but dying… Heaven, as you know it, didn’t exist back then. Neither did Hell. There were no souls, only celestial energy. I remember being shown the first soul. It was a tiny thing. There was barely any energy in it, and I remember my brothers and sisters sneering at it. I found it beautiful. There was so much potential, so much_ life _! Dean, I… Am I to believe that it was all created just to end like this?_

 

 

 

 


	2. Founding

**Scene 2 - Founding**

Gabriel trailed behind Castiel and Dean. He didn’t want to lose them again, but he didn’t want Castiel to sense him, either. He was an astute little angel, even cut off from Heaven as he was. The stories of his resurrection had made for fascinating listening, to be sure. Gabriel had been quietly amused at the Host’s confusion, and he’d always wondered if Castiel knew who’d raised him. Lucifer used to have that kind of power, once. Gabriel really had no idea what he could do now, only that he didn’t fancy getting in his way.

Still, the only way to get to Dean and get him to say yes, finally, before Luci wiped out every remaining god and demi-god and half of humanity besides, was through Castiel. And that meant consorting with Lucifer’s enemies, and those of the Heavenly Host. It was a bit of a gamble, but as long as Gabriel could keep his presence hidden, he should be able to swing things into the direction he wanted them to go.

Dean was halfway there already, anyway, his brother’s _yes_ gnawing away at his resolve, and Castiel didn’t look like much of a help, slumped in shotgun and sleeping off his hangover.

Gabriel really hated the backseat. It was crammed and uncomfortable, and really tiny – how did they expect a guy to wrench his six wings into so little space? Granted, Gabriel had gotten used to a human-ish vessel centuries ago, but as Trickster he could flaunt his power wherever he went, and now he had to bottle it all up if he didn’t want Castiel to notice. Question was if Cas had already become deaf to angelic wavelength as he had become insensible to the crazed demon that had jumped them back in the parking lot. Or maybe that was just because he had been stinking drunk and half-asleep.

Gabriel wouldn’t have put him down as the sleepy kind of drunk. More as the bubbly kind.

 

_“Gabriel! Gabriel!”_

_Gabriel sighed. The fledgling – Castiel – had formed an… attachment to him. It wasn’t like he didn’t like the kid, he did, truly, but sometimes his siblings were just so tiresome. Besides, Castiel really should have outgrown the curious fledgling state by now – he was training to be a soldier, now, and a damned good one, too, if what Michael was saying was anything to go by. He would command his own garrison, eventually. “What is it now, Castiel?”_

_Castiel folded his wings neatly, already looking the part of the warrior – if his grace hadn’t been shining with barely concealed excitement. “I have been asked to go to Earth.”_

_“That’s lovely, Castiel,” Gabriel said, not really getting what the fuss was about. Earth was all well and good, but really it was quite, quite boring. Father had insisted on letting things run their course, and even though there were so many interesting species planned, it was all going so slowly. Gabriel couldn’t wait for his own contribution to make an appearance, but for now he had to contend himself with toying with a simulacrum._

_Castiel expressed confusion at his disinterest. “It will be my first time. I…”_

_“Well? Spit it out.”_

_“Forgive me. It is not my place to ask.” Castiel dropped his wings in a submissive gesture, a seraph showing reference to an archangel, and all of the sudden, Gabriel really hated it._

_“Screw that. Look, Cassie!” Gabriel made his creation appear between them, as it would once be, tiny soul glimmering between strings of complex DNA, and a form as it would appear to lesser beings. It didn’t have a name, then – Father didn’t bother naming things that weren’t his own; he kept saying the crowning glory of his creation would take on that task – but the humans would later term it ‘platypus’._

_Castiel watched it with awe, but didn’t say anything else._

_Gabriel let it fade away. “What do you think?”_

_“It is very unlike Michael’s and Lucifer’s creations,” Castiel remarked._

_“Yes, because_ they _are boring. C’mon. I’ll show you where it’ll live. But be careful where you tread. Father’s creation is still very fragile at this state.”_

It never really ceased to be fragile, not from Gabriel’s point of view, anyway. Humanity liked to think that what they were seeing was the endpoint of evolution, no matter which time period you’d witness, but really their existence was proving just as fleeting. Not for the first time, he wondered whether this – the apocalypse that was now looming – had always been the endpoint their Father had wanted for humanity. Lucifer certainly didn’t care. He just wanted to eradicate the creations that he was supposed to love – and which drew their Father’s love away from them. Gabriel wondered if Luci knew that there had been no sign of their Dad anywhere in eons – in the last thousand years of human reckoning, he had interfered only once, and only marginally – but really he’d been gone since Lucifer’s Fall, it had just taken everyone a while to notice. Gabriel wondered if Castiel knew.

 

The buzzing of a cell phone startled Castiel awake. The sensation of waking up was still foreign and unpleasant, but he felt more like himself, at least. The disappointment, the sense of disillusion was still there. Castiel had expected it to be, of course, but he still couldn’t help wondering how humans coped with these kinds of sensations. He wasn’t even sure whether the mere fact that he was doubting, that his belief was wavering, should not result in an erasure of his existence.

Humans were mistaken, of course, in that a person without fixed beliefs was bound to hell – as long as a person’s soul was pure, Heaven was happy enough to accept them. After all, every soul that descended to Hell only gave the powers of darkness more force, and in days like these, Heaven could use all the power it could get. Not that there was even a chance of defeating Lucifer as long as Michael was without vessel.

But, Castiel wasn’t human. He didn’t possess a soul, he had grace, and angelic beings weren’t – couldn’t be – measured by the same standards. They were tools of Heaven, soldiers – free will wasn’t for them, and as such, their belief had to be absolute. Castiel supposed that by all rights he should be afraid – and maybe he was; the world was coming to an end, after all – but as long as Dean was still there… and Dean needed him.

Dean had taken the call, despite being at the wheel, navigating the cell phone with ease. Castiel still found the devices cumbersome and unnecessarily complex.

“Bobby? … Yeah. Right. We’re on our way.” Dean ended the call, flipping the phone back into the coin tray without even taking his eyes of the road or his left hand off the wheel. “Bobby’s found us a base.”

 

_Camp Chitaqua – Youth Camp_ read the sign by the turning in the forest, and Dean had to slow the Impala down to a crawl on the bumpy road.

“’s an old boy scout camp, apparently. Owner’s dead, so it’s been abandoned, and there was a haunting, but Rufus took care of it a while back. It’s in good enough shape, apparently.”

Castiel just nodded, watching the trees move by. He had no concept of ‘boy scout camps’. He had visited many human campsites during his existence, but before he had raised Dean from Hell, he hadn’t been to Earth for many years. He suspected that if everything else had changed as much as it had – the amount of ‘pop culture’ was staggering; there used to be times when a few stories were all that was needed – this campsite was going to be entirely unlike the ones Castiel had seen.

When they climbed out of the car, it didn’t look much like a campsite at all. There were a couple of scattered buildings, wooden huts. There was a fireside, but it seemed to be for recreation only, as there were wires connecting the buildings – electricity. It was a marvelous invention, Castiel supposed, but seemed to him rather too dependent on resources that were hard to come by on one’s own. It was surprising, really, that a species that prided themselves so much on their individuality as humanity should be at the same time so dependent on the collective. Castiel remembered the days when the community was the only guarantee for survival for humanity, and it seemed like nothing much had changed – only now it had become invisible, even to the humans. Castiel was fairly certain that Dean didn’t see it. For Dean, ‘community’ had always been just him and Sam, but he was wrong in that, of course. Without their acquaintances like Bobby, they wouldn’t have made it as far.

Of course, for angels, ‘community’ was everything. The garrison, his brothers and sisters, they had all been one at some point or another. Castiel still remembered how painful it had been to lose so many in the siege of Hell, how alone he had felt then as he dove down into the pit to find Dean. It was nothing compared to how alone he felt now, cut off from the Host, its presence only an echo, easily outshone by Dean’s soul. It would get worse, he knew, but he dared not imagine it. He didn’t know if it was possible for an angel to survive this slow, gradual Fall. Falling had cost Anna her memories, and yet she had found her way back into the collective. For Castiel, everything was different. He wasn’t part of the collective anymore, not really.

“There you are! Get your asses over here!” Bobby had appeared at the door of one of the huts at ground level, gruffly, aggressively turning his wheelchair around to head back inside. Castiel regretted many things, but being unable to heal Bobby was at the forefront – just surpassed by not telling Dean what he knew sooner, and not being able to save Sam. It wouldn’t be long, now, until his healing power had faded completely. The effect alcohol had had on him was indicative of that.

“Sweet!” was Dean’s comment when he saw what Bobby had discovered. Castiel wasn’t sure he shared the sentiment. The petrol-run generator seemed to him to be inelegant and cumbersome, not unlike the vehicles Dean was so fond of.

“It’s dead”, Bobby groused, “but we’ll get it running between us. Makes us independent of the main grid, at any rate.”

“As long as you don’t run out of fuel,” Castiel felt compelled to say.

“Geez, thanks for the vote of confidence, Cas. When did you become such a pessimist, anyway?”

Castiel didn’t find it necessary to offer a reply. Dean was in a good mood – better than he had been in months, and Castiel had no interest in ruining it. However, Dean’s understanding of the enormity of the catastrophe hanging over their heads seemed to him to be sadly limited. He admired the courage, the fact that Dean had pulled himself out of his funk and was carrying on even after _it_ had happened, but now more than ever, overconfidence could be deadly.

He glanced about the grounds. “You’re planning to establish a base here.”

“Well, yeah. Sioux Falls has too many people. It’s not safe for them or for us. Not with the forces of Heaven after our asses, and who knows what the devil is up to.” Dean looked past him at the huts. “I know it doesn’t look like much, but we’ll fix it up. Get some people together. Hunters. People in the know. Then we’ll go looking for the Colt.”

Castiel was doubtful. “Dean-”

“He’s right”, Bobby said, “for once. I’ve been phoning around, getting people up to speed. They’re good folks, but none of them have dealt with anything on this scale before. They’re drowning. Need a place to regroup that isn’t about to be overrun by demons.”

Castiel didn’t respond. Truthfully, he didn’t hold out much hope.


	3. Building

**Scene 3 - Building**

It was laughable. Completely and utterly laughable. Gabriel watched Dean lug building material from Bobby’s pickup into the shed they’d designated storage area, and then head back out for more stuff. They were stocking up, which was sensible, at least, but it was still laughable. The apocalypse was looming, and Michael’s true vessel was building sheds. Meanwhile, the radios were fussing over the new super-virus, over the devastating natural disasters that had flattened two major US cities, but as yet the largest part of humanity was oblivious to the destruction that was heading for them. Gabriel supposed there was a strange sort of irony in the fact that no species really was aware of its imminent extinction – the dinosaurs certainly hadn’t been. Nonetheless, the only people who knew were wasting their time in the middle of nowhere, instead of just getting it over with.

Dean seemed to have some ludicrous idea of being able to fight it which made Gabriel want to teach him a definite lesson in stupidity, but he had to hold back on his powers if he didn’t want to have an angry seraph in his face.

From the looks of it, Castiel seemed to share Gabriel’s sentiments, at least, even though he didn’t voice them. He had reluctantly been delegated to do the heavy lifting, after he had proven entirely inept with a hammer and nails. It was degrading work, far below anything an angel should submit to, no matter what rank. It did Castiel credit, Gabriel supposed, that he had only glared at Dean once, and then had proceeded to do what was asked of him.

Still, Gabriel could see the strain the heavy physical labor put on the angel’s grace. It wouldn’t be too long before he could no longer shift large palettes of supplies without effort – in fact, it looked as though it already took effort, though it wouldn’t have been visible to his human companions. Gabriel, of course, could sense the strain in Castiel’s grace, in the shadows of his true form.

He kept waiting for a moment to talk to him. Dean was stubborn as a mule, but Castiel knew Gabriel for who he was, and seemed more likely to see reason. If he loved humanity so much, surely he would agree that it was better to spare them the suffering that was to come and hasten the apocalypse to its inevitable end?

When the moment finally came, Dean had gone away to take Bobby back to his house, and Castiel had finished the work and was resting on the steps of the only currently inhabitable hut, in which Dean had put up camp. Castiel still liked to pretend he didn’t sleep, even though Gabriel had seen him curl up on the backseat of the Impala for at least three hours each night with evident reluctance. Right at this instant, he was contemplating an apple, evidently debating whether to eat it or not. The fact alone that he had sat down did tell Gabriel all he needed to know about his current state of exhaustion. It was as good a moment as any, and might not get him killed.

Gabriel descended from the roof on which he had perched, munching chocolate and marshmallow bars of his own creation, and slowly let both his form and his grace fade into the visual spectrum. He’d not expected to find himself slammed against the wall an instant later, and angel blade at this throat. “Whoa, just a moment, lil’ bro!” Okay, so he had underestimated Castiel. Oops.

Castiel didn’t ease up, but didn’t drive the point home, either. “Gabriel.” His voice was a hoarse growl. “So it was you. We were told you had died.”

“Ehh… not the first time the Host was wrong.”

Castiel’s grip on the weapon tightened. Not the ideal moment for flippancy, then.

“Why have you been following us?”, Castiel growled.

Oh. So he hadn’t been as careful as he’d thought – or Castiel was even better at this than he let on. Gabriel was impressed, really. He tapped his index finger against the angel blade. “How about you put this away and we talk, eh?”

Castiel didn’t move.

Gabriel sighed, rather dramatically. “Oh, come on! You _know_ me! Not going to do anything to you or your precious humans, I swear.”

“Why have you been following us? Who sent you?”

“No one sent me, bucko! I’ve gone a little rogue, in case you hadn’t noticed. My own personal witness protection. I haven’t been to Heaven in… uh, a couple of thousand years? I’m an archangel, okay? I don’t follow anyone’s orders.”

Castiel shifted his stance. He couldn’t really do Gabriel any harm – sure, the angel blade was nasty, but it wouldn’t kill him, it’d take an archangel’s blade for that – and Gabriel was sure that Castiel knew that. He probably also knew that Gabriel just needed to flick his fingers to fling him across the yard or obliterate him. Not that Gabriel was going to, it just mattered that he could.

“What do you want?” Castiel asked.

“Oh, just have a little chat with you – and Dean-o, when he gets back.”

Castiel’s grace flared with anger – in his true form, Gabriel would have been able to see his wings rising. It was impressive, really, this show of defiance in face of a being so much more powerful than he could ever hope to be.

“Please. I’m not Michael or Lucifer. If I’d planned to do anything, I could have done it by now, and you wouldn’t be able to stop me.”

Castiel finally lowered the blade and gave Gabriel a bit of space. “Talk, then.”

“First, let’s get comfy.”

Gabriel could feel Castiel going on alert, but by that time, it was already too late. Not that he’d done anything much. He just transported them inside the hut, created two rather boring armchairs and a plate of fruit. It wasn’t his most inventive work, but hey, he hadn’t exactly have time to plan, and he’d also had the angel blade to take care of.

Castiel didn’t seem exactly pleased to see it in Gabriel’s hand, half rising out of his chair, but Gabriel only used it to spear a slice of melon. “Relax, would you?” He flung his legs over the armrest, settling into the cushions.

Castiel scowled. “It has proven unwise of late to ‘relax’ in the presence of any of my siblings.” There was no bitterness in his tone, only gruff anger, but Gabriel could see it in his eyes.

“I’m trying to understand you here, Cassie. You must realize what you’re doing here is pointless. Building a camp? For Dad’s sake! Even you have to see that Dean is just hiding from his responsibility.”

Castiel avoided his gaze. “Dean is… grieving. He needs time.”

“Time humanity doesn’t have. The Host is losing at every front. Michael needs his vessel.”

“No.”

Gabriel sighed, biting into the melon and waving his hand at the plate. “Eat!”

Castiel, unsurprisingly, did not take him up on the offer. “Which side are you on, Gabriel?”

“Me? I’m on nobody’s side.”

“Michael’s or Lucifer’s?”

Gabriel rolled his eyes. “Look, Castiel. I know you find this hard to grasp, but I’m on nobody’s side. I don’t want to have anything to do with either of them, or I wouldn’t have left Heaven in the first place. I just want this farce to end.”

“You want the apocalypse come to pass.”

“A gold star for the angel!”

“Why?”

Gabriel lowered the sword, the question hitting rather too close to home. “Why? You have no idea what it’s been like! Sure, you witnessed it at the side lines, but you have no idea of the kinds of fights Michael and Lucifer used to get into! And it’s still going on! They are my brothers, Castiel! Do you have any idea what Lucifer’s doing while you carry firewood? He’s obliterated the olden gods. Obliterated them! Michael used to sink islands in his rage! I just want it to be over!”

Castiel shook his head.

“Dad’s not coming back. You know that, right? He’s not going to fix this. This is all just putting off the inevitable,” Gabriel said, trying to be reasonable.

“Dean won’t say yes.”

“Because he’s a stubborn ass. We’ll just have to convince him, then.”

Castiel flared, rising to his feet in earnest. “You do not speak for me.”

“Alright.” Gabriel speared a pineapple, leaving the angel blade in it, and wiped the melon juice off on his pants. “Maybe I don’t. But I know what you’ve been thinking, Castiel, and I know you don’t really believe you have any chance – to stop the apocalypse, really? Just think about it. I’ll be around.” And with that, he let himself fade from visibility.

Castiel could clearly still sense him, which was a surprise, but from the way the seraph turned, looking about the room, at least he was impossible to locate. Gabriel rose, moving away from his chair, just in case Castiel decided to chance it and plunge his sword into it. Nasty little things, angel blades.

Castiel was still scowling, trying to free his blade from the pineapple. Gabriel hoped his nudge had been enough. The angel was already doubting the wisdom of his and Dean’s actions, maybe a little encouragement was all that was needed. Gabriel would have to keep watching, of course, but for now, his work was done. Well, almost.

He gave the pineapple a little poke with his graze, and the fruit split into neat slices, spraying Castiel with juice. Castiel let his blade vanish with a sigh, before he lifted his hand and tentatively tasting the pineapple juice coating his fingers.

Gabriel couldn’t contain a smile. For all his show of wrath, Castiel was still the curious little seraph.

 


	4. Fighting

**Act II**

**Scene 1 - Fighting**

“Dean! Behind you!”

Dean slammed the butt of his shotgun over his shoulder, not even looking back, speeding up and ducking behind the relative shelter of the turned-over pick-up they were crouching behind.

“These fucking things are fucking everywhere!” John Fitzgerald fired a well-placed bullet, ending the lasts of Dean’s pursuers.

Castiel didn’t bother telling John that these ‘things’ were as human as him or Dean. John was a good enough hunter, but back in the day he had hunted deer and the occasional grizzly, not supernatural beings, and the current situation still strained his mindset.

Instead, Castiel tightened his grip on the blade and directed his attention at Dean while the other kept a lookout. There was an ugly bruise forming on Dean’s cheekbone, but his skin was unbroken and his eyes fiercely determined, a bag slung over his shoulder.

“I got everything I could. A bit of gas, first aid stuff, some junk food.”

A gas station wasn’t exactly the most lucrative for a raid, but it had seemed safe – not that they’d ever have set foot into this town had they known they would stumble right into a Croatoan infested area. In the large cities, the outbreaks were well documented, but here, in the middle of nowhere, one town after another was dropping off the grid, and no one really noticed. Castiel didn’t know how the infection spread to those backwater townships, whether it was brought in by travelers, distributed by demons or by Lucifer himself.

Dean shoved a new clip into his gun. “No chance you can zap us out of here, Cas?”

Castiel shook his head. He didn’t know why Dean kept asking – he hadn’t been able to fly properly in months, let alone with passengers. He directed his gaze away from his charge, looking out into the empty street. They would be making a run for it as soon as Dean had caught his breath and reloaded his gun. Castiel carried a pistol, too, now, but he still preferred to fight with his blade when he could. A normal gun did nothing against demons.

“Any demon activity?” Dean asked.

“None.”

Dean gave a thin-lipped nod. “Ready, Fitzgerald?”

John dropped to his haunches and spun the magazine of his gun. “Yeah. Ready when you are, Winchester.”

“Right. Let’s go.” Dean gave Cas a harsh shove, as if he weren’t already moving, and off they were at a fast jog down the road.

Castiel really was at a loss how to everything had ‘gone to shit’, as Dean would say, so fast. The worldwide panic about pandemics had seemed like another one of those weird elements of the internationally connected human countries to him, and it wasn’t like he could just fly around on reconnaissance missions like he used to. He kept telling himself that he couldn’t have known – that it was one thing to be able to sense an increase in demon population, but another entirely to pick up on a threat originating in humanity itself. Of course, he had known that Lucifer’s ultimate goal was to lure Michael down from Heaven to confront his brother, and that he would not stop until the whole of humanity had been obliterated. The demons were nothing but tools in his eyes, but several powerful ones, rising from the depth of hell when Lucifer did, had their own agenda. It was difficult enough to keep track of the large scale destructions which Bobby had theorized were caused by Lucifer raising the Horsemen.    

“Fuck!”

They’d just rounded to corner to the road that would lead them to the car – only to find it blocked by a man and a woman, grinning, their teeth bared.

John let off two quick shots – he was always quick to draw – and the bullets hit head on, but the two barely flinched, their eyes flashing black.

“Fuck! Cas, you said no demons!”

He had – and he still couldn’t sense them. He could barely see them for anything other than human, just the faintest trace of their true form visible behind their vessels when he really looked. This was very disquieting news, but there was no time to explain that to Dean, now.

Cas shoved himself to the front, placing Dean, who had no way to defend himself against demons, firmly behind his back. “Go around. I’ll hold them off.” He flipped the blade in his hand, tightening his grip. “Go!”

From the sound of it, John started running first, but Dean wasn’t too far behind.

Cas’s eyes never left the demons, his vessel easily dropping into a stable stance.

The demons seemed happy enough to let the others go. “Hello, angel,” the one possessing a woman sneered. Castiel didn’t respond to the taunt. If he had been angel enough, he would have sensed them. He should have sensed them, and not let the others run straight into them. It was lucky that the demons wanted to toy with them and not go for a quick kill, even if the ease with which demons now walked the Earth was another sign how bad things had become, without Cas really noticing.

They circled around each other, the two demons taking Cas in their middle, spitting insults. They both carried knifes – ordinary ones, thankfully, no angel blades. They had all the time in the world, of course, and there were ways and means to kill angels other than these. Old demons, powerful demons, would know of these, and it made Cas nervous that he couldn’t tell how old these particular specimens were.

“If you want to live, I suggest you leave now.”

The demon in the male vessel laughed, a harsh, bitter sound that for a second, just a second, reminded Cas of Dean. “If you could kill us, you would have done it by now.”

It was true. Castiel hadn’t been able to smite demons or any other creature in a long time. Once, a glimpse of his true form alone would have turned the demons to ash, but his true form seemed increasingly inaccessible, even his wings feeling heavy and foreign.

“Castiel”, the woman added, tasting the name, “the boss knows all about you.”

“Lucifer will kill you, in the end. Why do you still serve him?”

“Lucifer _created_ us!” the woman snarled, her fist curling and teeth bared, eyes perpetually black – but she didn’t lunge at him.

They were good fighters, clever, but Cas had no choice but to engage them if he wanted to get out of this alive – and Dean still needed him.


	5. Healing

**Scene 2 - Healing**

“Cas! Cas, stay awake, do you hear! Cas! Goddammit!”

“The bleeding isn’t stopping, Winchester.”

“I know!”

Gabriel fluttered down from his perch, to get a better look. He had zapped all the way over from Seattle, where one of the Horsemen was causing mayhem, when he’d sensed Castiel’s distress, his unconscious call for help. The angel’s control on his grace was slipping rapidly these days, and Gabriel wondered how many of their brothers and sisters had heard the desperate call – but they wouldn’t be able to find him. Not now that Dean had lugged him back to his hut, which Cas had warded against every evil thing in existence, including angels. But angel warding was a complex thing, and Castiel couldn’t risk locking himself out. Gabriel had never bothered with sigils, never learning more than what knowledge had been given to him at his creation, but he knew enough to figure out that the warding kept the hut invisible to anyone who was looking for an angel, but if they knew where to look already, they could find Castiel just as well. Gabriel could feel the buzz of similar warding elsewhere in the camp, probably the cabin Dean had chosen for himself. After all, as _the_ vessel, Dean was a primary target. Gabriel, of course, already knew where to go, but as far as he could see, he was the only one.

He and Castiel hadn’t spoken since their first encounter, and Gabriel could tell that Castiel hadn’t mentioned it to Dean, either. The elder Winchester still remained as stubborn as ever, and Gabriel was just about at the end of his patience. He was all for giving the human time to realize his mistake when the degree to which his world was disintegrating anyway finally caught up with him, but this was getting ridiculous. Seattle was pretty much done for, as far as Gabriel could figure out, War had made a mess of things and one half of the population was slowly slaughtering the other half. It was a shame. Gabriel had _liked_ Seattle – great ice cream.

And still, here he was, leaning against the wall of a surprisingly sturdy hut with a rickety door and fraying curtains, invisibly watching as Dean and one of the humans they’d picked up along the way were trying to fix Castiel.

If Gabriel hadn’t heard Castiel’s instinctive cry for assistance, drilled into him over eons of fighting in a garrison, a community, he’d have thought it wasn’t that bad. There were a few cuts and scrapes, his coat had taken the worst of it, as had his hand, where he seemed to have deflected a blade with nothing but his sleeve for protection. But the fact was, Castiel was unconscious, bleeding, and there was barely even a flicker of grace.

Dean had broken out the alcohol and sewing kit, and sent the other guy – John Fitzgerald, ordinary human – for bandages. “And find Bobby!”

All right, so Dean had managed to build up something of an organization here. A _camp_. A bunch of hunters and fighters from the area, dropping in and leaving again as they liked. The only permanent residents, as far as Gabriel had gathered, were still only Cas and Dean, even after so many months, though Cas wasn’t sleeping in the Impala anymore and the huts had all been fixed up – to functionality, if not to comfort. But it wasn’t like it had gotten Dean any further in his foolish attempt to kill the Devil. If anything, it was stopping Cas and him from being on the road, and apart from what the people they met up with were reporting – which, if Gabriel knew humans at all, would be widely inaccurate – they were cut off. Maybe it was time to teach Dean a lesson.

The Winchester was sewing up Cas’s hand with efficiency, but not a small amount of passive aggression. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me you couldn’t sense demons anymore, Cas? The mission was a disaster anyway, I don’t need you throwing wrenches into the works on top of everything else.”

Castiel, of course, didn’t hear him. Gabriel could tell he wasn’t fully unconscious, just teetering on the edge of wakefulness, but he was too out of it, anyway. He might be able to sense Dean’s presence, sense Gabriel’s presence, too, maybe, but that was about it. It was bad.

He really couldn’t have another brother dying on him. Too many were already falling as Michael’s cannon fodder where he kept sending them into battle against Lucifer’s demon hordes.

“Step aside, Winchester.”

Dean flinched violently, scrambling to his feet and for a weapon slightly larger than a sewing needle. But Castiel’s angel blade had been abandoned at the other end of the room when they’d brought Cas in, well behind Gabriel’s back.

“What the hell!”

“Not quite, bucko.” Gabriel didn’t bother drawing his own blade. Dean was no threat. “Now step aside so I can fix your angel buddy.”

“You’re the Trickster! You _killed_ me! No way am I letting you near Cas.”

“Ah yes, about that…”

Dean raised his gun.

“Seriously? Trickster or no, you know that that thing won’t kill me.”

“Who are you?” Dean’s soul was flaring up in deviance, and Castiel made a keening sound in response. So he could sense it, even in unconsciousness. Good.

Gabriel reached out with his grace, flooding him with soothing sensations of home. He wasn’t a healer per se, far from it, but he’d looked over Raphael’s shoulders enough times to have picked up a few tricks. After all, that was what he did best.

“I don’t have time for this, Dean, and neither does Castiel.”    

With a flick of his fingers, he had Dean safely trussed up and out of the way on a chair in the corner of the room. His shock and muffled protests would have been quite funny in any other situation really, but Gabriel’s patience with the human was too fragile for him to get distracted now. Castiel, now smothered in a blanket of feel-good sensations, didn’t even twitch.

Gabriel settled down at the edge of the bed and held his hand over the damaged palm, first. He could almost hear Dean exclaiming “Hey, I just fixed that!” but the gag muffled the sound sufficiently. Besides, he really had done quite a poor job, one that with Cas’s current diminished healing powers would certainly leave painful scarring. Luckily, Gabriel still had all the juice he needed.

Castiel’s grace soared as soon as he started working, but it was a fragile, weakened thing that actually scared Gabriel. The angel had never been so weak, not in his memory, anyway, not even when he was the one seraph who couldn’t sit still during Raphael’s lectures. Gabriel ended up actually bolstering Cas’s grace a little while he was fixing all the cuts and scrapes and replenishing the blood loss of the vessel. There was nothing he could do about Cas being cut off from Heaven, but he could stall the further diminishing of his powers, just a little.

When he was done, he rose from the bed and lifted the blanket of power he had spread out over Castiel. The angel immediately began to stir, restless, his mouth opening to an unspoken sound.

In the meantime, Dean had managed to topple over the chair to which he was tied. Of course. Gabriel sighed. He didn’t want to deal with this now. He had to get away, sort through the stuff that was going on in his head and maybe blow off a little steam.

He clicked his fingers, releasing the bonds all at once and dropping Dean to the floor, where he landed with an “umpf” and a glare. “I’ll see you around, Dean. Think about what you’re doing here. I’ve got a Horseman to kill.”

 


	6. Living

**Scene 3 - Living**

_I remember being in Heaven. We were… training. Yes, angels have weapons training, Dean. It is nothing like you can imagine. The thunderstorms of prehistoric times – those were my brothers and sisters and I, tearing through the heavens and honing our skill. I have never been able to fly so freely since humanity began to evolve into intelligence – actually, that it untrue. I flew freely when I raised you from Perdition, like the olden times. Then, my garrison was dying around me, but back in the day, before Lucifer’s Fall, I was just a seraph amongst others. You have no understanding of the discipline and rigor required of seraphs. You cannot possibly comprehend, but I suppose you would call it a drill._

_I remember Phanuel slipping and his blade tearing through my wings. We had flown in formation, but I couldn’t hold me position. Phanuel was young and unpracticed, no blame is on him. I wasn’t badly hurt. Here on Earth, bound to a vessel, the wound might have killed me, but firmly connected with the Host, within the reaches of Heaven, I was perfectly fine. I shouldn’t even have broken formation until the practice was finished but… It was my first injury. And I suppose I was foolish, and proud. My wings were always so beautiful and strong, and I needed to tend to them. And so, I abandoned my comrades. I was punished, later, and rightly so. It was a betrayal. If it had been a battle situation, the garrison could have been slaughtered through my disruption._

_I went to find Gabriel. He wasn’t a healer, Dean – Raphael was the archangel who was most gifted in that, but Raphael was also my instructor. Gabriel was… unusual. I think that is why Father chose him for a messenger, because from the start he was so… human. If_ I _could develop doubts enough to rebel, I am surprised, really, that Gabriel never chose to Fall._

_He never had a word of reproach that wasn’t spoken in jest, in these days. Barely anyone of us understood his humor, but that rarely stopped Gabriel. His grace was bright gold, and very beautiful. It wasn’t pure, not like Lucifer’s – there was a sharp, powerful, righteous edge to it. I don’t know why I have always felt drawn to him, of all the archangels. As a seraph, I should not even have spoken to him without being addressed first. Gabriel, I think, liked me._

_He repaired my wing, that day, and soothed my mind. He reminded me of my duty to my siblings without punishment. He…_

“Gabriel?”

“Cas! Hey, Cas!”

Castiel blinked open his vessel’s eyes, coming face to face with Dean sitting at his bedside. The demons. He had been injured. His grace hadn’t been enough. “Dean. I’m sorry.”

Dean ignored his apology, much to Castiel’s dismay. He should have realized that he couldn’t sense demons anymore, that his powers had gotten too weak to be even of the slightest use.

“Good, you really are awake this time. You’ve slept after...”

There was a new bruise forming on Dean’s cheek. Castiel reached out, unthinkingly, then drew his hand back. He couldn’t fix it. Not anymore. “Dean, what happened?”

“Hey, are you okay? You still sound a little out of it.” Dean scrambled up from his chair, fetching a glass of water. “Here. To clear your head.”

“I’m fine.” Castiel examined his palm, sensing a faint, tingly echo of something that wasn’t his own. “What happened?”

Dean ground his teeth. “Friggin’ Trickster showed up. Tied me up in the corner and then did this. He said he was fixing you. The bleeding wasn’t stopping. Cas, are you… are you human, now?”

Castiel carefully reached inside, examining his grace. It pulsed a little stronger than he could remember it being – perhaps being asleep had helped, or perhaps… “I don’t think so. Not fully, anyway, but my powers are… very diminished.”

“Yeah, I figured. Who was that guy, Cas?”

“He’s not a trickster. No trickster would have that kind of power, Dean. I think… I think it might have been Gabriel.”

“Gabriel? As in the archangel? Another one of those angelic dicks?”

“I thought he was dead.” Castiel said, thinking of the time the Host had officially declared Gabriel deceased after all searches for him had been to no avail. Gabriel had hidden himself well.

“Yeah, so did I after the first time I killed him. Fucker keeps coming back,” Dean said, with no small amount of anger.

It was strange, that anger. If Castiel was reading the situation correctly, Gabriel had just healed him, maybe even saved his life, and yet Dean seemed to feel nothing but contempt for him. He had never heard Dean speak about a Trickster before, but he supposed it mustn’t have seemed important. After all, Dean hadn’t even believed in angels when Castiel stood before him. If he had encountered Gabriel before Hell, he would have had no way of knowing. “He is not… a dick, Dean. At least, I don’t think so. He isn’t working with Michael, or Lucifer.”

“So whose side is he on?”

“No one’s – or so he says.” Castiel closed his hands around the glass. He knew that it was time to tell Dean of Gabriel’s visit. He couldn’t remember why he had kept on pushing it back originally. Now, it was because he didn’t want to cause any more distress. There were already so many parties urging Dean to say yes that he hadn’t even mentioned his personal role in the apocalypse to the hunters they encountered. Castiel had thought it slightly unfair to them, but he had to respect Dean’s choice. He was good for little else, these days.

“He wants me to say yes,” Dean guessed.

“Yes.”

“Then he can fuck off. I’m not turning into an angel condom and have those assholes wipe out the planet.”

“Lucifer is already doing that now, Dean. I know we’ve been helping the hunters, and it is a good cause, but I think we should discuss what you are planning to do about that.”

“I won’t say yes.”

“I wasn’t suggesting you do. It is your choice, Dean, and if I believe in anything, it is this.”

Someone cleared their throat, rapping their knuckles against the doorframe – John. “Winchester? Bobby isn’t anywhere in the Camp. Nicole says he’s driven out with Jay.”

Dean immediately jumped into action. He was a different man on hunts, these days. Determined, purposeful, but cold. Castiel knew he was grieving, still, but sometimes the lack of emotional response scared him. It reached as far as Dean’s soul, and Castiel had not seen him so numb since Hell.

“Where to?”

John shrugged. “No idea.”

“Cas, come with me.”

 


	7. Dying

**Scene 4 - Dying**

The funeral pyre flared high, illuminating the semi-circle they had cut into trees and undergrowth to build it. Dean had gotten everyone currently in the camp to help – many, in fact, had volunteered. Bobby had been important to all of them, all of them hunters who came to him for information, intel, fake FBI badges.

Castiel’s muscles ached from the hard work, and his heart ached for the loss. Bobby had been a kind, if gruff soul, a wise source of support to many and a man of knowledge. Even with his disability, he had continued the fight, and Castiel had admired him for that as his own powers kept failing and he felt less and less like an angel each day. He had spoken to Bobby, sometimes, always finding him willing to listen, and occasionally giving valid advice.

Castiel knew that, for Dean, he had been a father figure, the last the hunter had had left, and he could not begin to sympathize with the pain it had to be causing Dean. If there had been anything, anything at all he could have done to lighten that burden… But Dean wasn’t speaking to him. He had not said a word to Castiel since they had come back, nor to anyone else beyond the most basic orders. Castiel could sense his anguish, burning fiercely through his soul, and part of him was relieved for the depth of feeling, but the lack of any of it on Dean’s expression was disquieting.

He supposed he had been delusional to think that Dean would confide in him, that he had become something of a friend, with whom Dean would be willing to share his grief, to whom Dean would open up, allow him to see his pain. Castiel had already seen Dean at his worst in Hell, after all.

It had been an unnecessary death, and perhaps that made it even worse. If Dean had known Jay did not bear an anti-possession tattoo, he would never have allowed him to even enter the Camp, Castiel was sure. Dean blamed himself for that. He also blamed Castiel – or, at least, Castiel blamed himself. If he hadn’t been injured through his own overestimation of his abilities, Dean wouldn’t have been by his bedside, and instead of Jay, he would have been the one to drive Bobby to his house. There still would have been a demon ambush, but with Dean’s fighting skills, they would both have survived. Castiel would have welcomed Dean blaming him. Anything but his silence.

He remembered clearly how they had found the front door broken down, the house reeking of sulfur and turned upside down by the fight – and Bobby had put up a fight, despite it all. There were bullet holes everywhere, not just in the back of Bobby’s wheelchair, lying toppled in the entrance to the living room. He had been going for the extra ammunition in the desk, Dean had said – the last thing he had said to Castiel, in fact. He didn’t need to mention that Bobby hadn’t made it. The demons had shot him in the back.

The flames soared high, and with a sigh, Dean stepped up to the fire, relinquishing the final piece of Bobby’s personal belongings to the flames – the small hipflask in which Bobby had kept his essential ration of whiskey. For a brief moment, the flames flickered blue as the thin metal melted and the alcohol burned.

Castiel knew that there was a bottle waiting for Dean in his cabin. He just hoped Dean wouldn’t turn him away when he came to join him.

 


	8. Mourning

**Scene 5 - Mourning**

Gabriel watched the funeral pyre from his usual perch on the roof of Castiel’s cabin, trying not to get involved but unable to tear his eyes away. It reminded him uncannily of the memorial volcano he had erected in Iceland, which had erupted only the day before (Gabriel might have miscalculated something at some point). The flare of red and the shooting sparks of the pyre were nothing like the volcanic eruption in scale, of course, but Gabriel supposed that to humans, they were equally majestic and awe-inspiring. There was a strange sort of irony in the fact that Dean should have chosen this quite similar method for the funeral of his surrogate father, when Gabriel had literally laid gods to rest.

Gabriel hadn’t planned on coming at all. He had been happy enough to let things play out in due time, now that Dean’s obstinacy was having consequence that hit closer to home. Not that losing his brother hadn’t done that, Gabriel supposed, but quite clearly it had not been enough. Gabriel was certain that now that Lucifer was directly responsible for Bobby Singer’s death, Dean would finally see sense and face him as he was supposed to do. End this folly. It was fine if he took time to grieve, it was only human, after all, and it would all be over soon enough.

Gabriel was certain of that, especially now that he knew for a fact that Castiel had talked to Dean about him, and that his previous visit had not gone unmentioned. Gabriel knew that because apparently he really couldn’t stay away. After talking to Dean and healing Castiel, he _had_ zapped to Seattle, and had managed to take War’s powers in quite a heroic display of aptitude and strength, if he said so himself. It hadn’t been pleasant, but now he owned a Horseman’s ring, and hey, he’d always wanted one of those. Afterwards, however, he had felt himself drawn back to Castiel’s side. There seemed to be an incessant pull between them, now, not unlike how Gabriel imagined the bond between garrison members feeling, which, naturally, he had not experienced himself.

When he had felt Castiel’s sudden burst of fear, he had crossed the country again in a heartbeat. For centuries, he had been perfectly happy away from the humorless dicks that were his older and from the mindless drones that were his younger brothers. And now, suddenly, he’d let this little rebellious angel get under his skin? What was so special about Castiel, anyway? And what in all heavens was wrong with Gabriel?

Not that it made any difference to his plans. Surely Castiel would now see sense, and through him, so would Dean. This prizefight had to happen, and it was better to have it sooner than later. Dean would see that now, with that fresh guilt hanging over his head. Gabriel only had to wait for the right time, and then see that he got away before Michael or Lucifer noticed his meddling. Wait out the apocalypse, and maybe a few hundred extra years of paradise to give Michael some time to sulk, then make his reappearance in Heaven. It would be glorious. A family reunion, withoutLucifer, and there would be no more fighting. There wouldn’t be anything left to fight over. Just Heaven and souls. Gabriel could thank Castiel and they could all finally go back to being a family.

The only problem in this plan currently had – Dean and Cas weren’t exactly talking to each other. They had barely exchanged a dozen words since they had found Bobby, and even though Castiel’s eyes were constantly on Dean, even when he was assisting in constructing the pyre, they hadn’t actually spoken. And that, that was just a touch worrying.

He waited for them in Dean’s cabin afterwards. Alcohol wasn’t really his thing, but he’d made do with a lollipop. He had not connection whatsoever to Bobby, aside from the fact that he’d been the guy who’d figured out how to kill a trickster and then nearly got chopped to bits by Gabriel’s chainsaw monster. Good, easy and fun old times. In any event, Bobby was just another human to him, if not to Dean. It made it really easy to use his death without even a twinge of conscience.

Gabriel stayed invisible for the time being. Depending on the night’s progression, he might have to offer a thought eventually, but even without his intervention, everything would go according to plan. Dean would mope and drink, and then he would decide to end it. But tomorrow evening, Gabriel could be back in witness protection and everything would be over.

Dean burst into the cabin stormily, flinging his jacket right through Gabriel onto the bed, and went straight for the whiskey, not even bothering with a glass. Castiel appeared behind him, hovering in the doorway.

“Dean…”

Dean took hold of the bottle, snatched two glasses from the shelf, and shouldered past Cas. “Let’s go.”

This was going quicker than expected. Gabriel ambled after them. He wasn’t in a rush. When Michael descended, he would know in an instant, and he felt no need to keep up with Dean. Not like Cas, who almost tripped over his own feet trying to keep up.

They ended up back at the pyre, where the mourning crowd had dispersed but the flames burned on, and would likely do so well into the morning. Dean leaned against the hood of his car, parked just close enough, and poured out the whiskey. He didn’t offer Cas a glass, but didn’t protest either when the angel settled down next to him on the hood.

“I’m very sorry, Dean.”

Dean made no response, chugging back his whiskey instead. Seeing that Castiel had not touched the other glass, he drank that, too. Then, for a very long while, no one said anything; Dean was busy enough drinking.  

Eventually, Dean began to slump against Cas, his posture collapsing the more he drank. His face remained closed off, and it didn't look like the conversation Gabriel had been expecting was about to take place - or if it did, Dean wouldn't remember a thing in the morning. It was worrying, really. Gabriel might have to bring out the big guns after all.

Castiel certainly didn’t look like he was going to start a conversation any time soon. In fact, he seemed to have zoned out – Gabriel knew for a fact that he wasn't listening to his brothers and sisters, because his grace was too weak for that, but who knew how much of angelic perception was left to him. Could he still sense the life all around them? The planetary rotation? Could he still expand his vision until everything he saw every detail of every molecular structure, tethered precariously together? Could he still see the ethereal energy of the living souls all around them, the animals who slowly crept back into the forest after realizing that the fire was contained? The few humans in the camp?

“If these dickwads think I'm giving in, they’re mistaken,” Dean said, suddenly, and way too loudly.

From Cas’s flinching, he hadn’t expected it, but his movement barely jostled Dean. More interesting was that Castiel shivered, tugging uneasily at his coat. He didn’t reply.

“I’m gonna keep on fighting, Cas, and if it's the last thing I do, I’m gonna kill the devil.”

“The apocalypse–”, Cas begins.

“– can screw itself. I've already lost Sammy, and Bobby..." Dean broke off with a hiccup, taking the final swallow directly out of the bottle. “No offense, but your brothers are just as much dicks as Lucifer. I’m not a sad fuck who’s just going to roll over. If Michael wants me to say yes, he should fucking quit the threats and start on the promises.”

 _Now that’s an idea_ , Gabriel thought.

“For angels, there is no higher promise than Paradise, Dean,” Cas said, but it didn’t sound like he still believed that.

“You talk like you’re not one of them!” Dean shoved himself off the hood, swaying slightly. “Jus’ leave me alone.”

Castiel watched him go for a few steps, his eyes cast downward. Then, he took pity in the inebriated human and caught up with him, supporting him back to his hut.

 

Dean fell asleep on Cas’s bed that night, and Castiel sat at the table long afterwards, staring into a half-empty glass of whiskey.

“What’s with the moping, lil’ bro?” Gabriel hadn’t expected Cas to shoot to his feet. He’d been leaning back casually in the chair opposite, but the sudden movement made him sit up straight. “Woah, no need to panic!”

“Gabriel. Revive Bobby Singer.”

Gabriel purposefully ignored the insolent command. “Of course it’s me! Who were you expecting? You know you’ve warded against angels.”

“That doesn’t seem to deter you,” Cas said, dryly, sinking back down.

“That’s because I know where to look, as you well know. Besides, I might have bolstered up your grace with a bit of my own. You can’t escape me!” It might have made for a hilarious _1984_ reference, but that would have gone straight over Cas’s head, so Gabriel didn't even bother. “Look, there’s nothing I can do about Singer. I can’t go around reviving people. That’ll get me noticed, and I can’t have that. Look, Cassie, I get that your human there is trying to be noble, but don’t you think it would spare him and everyone else a lot of suffering if he just were to say yes?”

“He won’t.”

“Bull crap. He will, eventually. It's just a question of how many humans will die horribly in the meantime. At least Michael and Luci's prizefight will just be one big bang, and that's it. Most humans won't even notice until it’s over.”

Castiel squinted at him, anger rolling through the fading shadows of his grace. “I don’t understand why you are advocating the apocalypse so much. You have spent many years on Earth.”

“Ehh... Well, the Nordic pantheon was quite entertaining. Didn’t feel much like Earth with those guys.” Even Gabriel had to admit that he was half-joking. Loki wasn’t exactly the Nordics favorite houseguest, and humans appreciated his humor so much more. Besides, there was only so much he could throw into a pagan god’s face. Apollo, especially, used to be almost as good as Gabriel at illusion work; Gabriel had thought he'd sensed his hand in the construction of the luxury hotel slash pocket universe that had become his grave. Humans were way more fun. But, they were also _so_ easy to reconstruct. It would get even easier once he had the power of millions of souls and imaginations at his disposal after the fight was over and everyone had gone to Heaven.

“Gabriel, Dean won’t say yes to Michael. He never intended to. If you can’t accept that, I need you to stay away from him.”

“Okay. Help me understand something here. Why do you care? I get that you’ve formed an attachment to him or something, but really Paradise is in your own best interests, Castiel. Right now, your grace is draining away, and you’re an outcast, a rebel. When Michael finally finishes things with Lucifer, we can go back to being a family, all of us."

Castiel looked at him as if he'd grown an extra head. And really, six was pushing it.

“What?”

“It is clear that you haven’t been in Heaven for a long time, Gabriel. I am sorry, but we will never be a family again. There are... others like Michael, like Lucifer. Since Father left...” Castiel trailed off, then, to Gabriel's utter astonishment, actually took a drink. “Since Father left, Heaven has split into factions. There... there are angels who believe he is dead, Gabriel. Raphael, for one. Don't you think that Raphael will want to shape Heaven after his own image? Not to speak of the fact that we have become just as good at torturing as the demons we used to hunt. You are deluding yourself, or maybe you just haven’t been able to see. Anna fell, because of all this. She couldn’t bear the fighting any more than you could, but she... was reawakened. I... She was returned to Heaven, and when she came back, she wasn’t the same. Gabriel, what use is there for us after Earth ceases to exist? We are soldiers of Heaven – a soldier can only fulfill orders, and who is to give them? Raphael? You? Seraphs aren’t capable of making their own choices – not like archangels.”

“Dean’s right. You don’t talk like your one of them.”

“I used to be. Now... I'm not sure. My point is, Gabriel, you are afraid. You think that the apocalypse will fix everything – it won't. The only chance we have of fixing this is learning from humanity.” Cas didn’t look up, and Gabriel didn’t buy it.

“Like you have? Please!” Gabriel couldn’t hold back the scoff. Hells yeah, humanity was fun – but there was no way Castiel’s descend was actually a learning curve. He was a sad shadow of what he used to be.

Castiel sighed. “At least listen. Free Will isn’t a foreign concept to you, but you are an archangel. It is Father’s most sacred gift, but in Heaven that will all be gone. Humans won’t have anything to strive for, there, but the angels… They won’t know what to do with themselves. Archangels are used to having the choice, but so many of your family – our family,” Castiel corrected, “are not. It is only a matter of time before someone tries to take control. And then, there will be factions, more than there already are. Certainly you don’t believe that Father will come back?”

Gabriel didn’t say anything, conjuring a snickers bar instead. Castiel stared at it, his gaze blank, but the remainder of his grace flaring with sadness.

“You can be glad I didn’t smite you when I had the chance,” Gabriel said, around a large bite.

“I didn’t think you would have.”

“Look, Cas. Get Dean to say yes, will you? When _have_ you become such a pessimist?” And with that, Gabriel left.    

****

 

****


	9. Grounding

**Act III**

**Scene 1 - Grounding**

Gabriel left Cas and Dean alone after that. He was angry, though he found it hard to pinpoint at whom. He couldn’t shake Castiel’s words. He really had become a very astute little seraph – or whatever he was, now. The thing was, he wasn’t entirely wrong. Gabriel remembered the battalions of seraphs that used to train in Heaven…

_“Really, Michael? Again?”_

_“They are soldiers. They need to train.”_

_Gabriel watched the maneuvers, wondering how long they would take, this time. Earth certainly would have to get used to very bad weather if they kept up the energy discharges. “You know they get injured in this.”_

_Michael flared his wings in irritation, red and gold flashing. “Minor injuries.”_

_“Well, Raphael doesn’t complain to_ you _.”_

_“Raphael has no reason to complain.”_

_“As you say, brother,” Gabriel said, dismissively, and turned his attention back to the flight, wishing he could stretch his own wings and stir things up a bit – but Michael would have a fit. “Can’t you at least give them an afternoon off or something?”_

_Michael laughed, actually attracting Lucifer’s attention from where he was overseeing the seraphs. Gabriel could feel his questioning, and sent a bit of mirth back. Luci, at least, wasn’t without humor. He’d tried to make Michael laugh so many times, but all they’d ever gotten out of him was this sarcastic, bitter thing that never heralded anything good._

_Still, Gabriel knew better than to flee, and so he stood his ground. “I’m glad this amuses you.”_

_“What are they supposed to do with free time, Gabriel? They are_ soldiers _! This is their purpose, and they understand that. Besides, they will be called to worship and guard, soon enough._

_Gabriel would have been able to point him to a particular seraph who had been known to run from maneuvers to watch Earth, instead, but he held his tongue. No need to get Castiel in trouble._

The thing was, Castiel had always been the exception. For most of the lower tier angels, Michael had been perfectly right – and so was Castiel now. They wouldn’t know what to do with themselves – but then, they never had the chance, right? Some had only been created shortly before Lucifer’s fall, when he and Michael were already continuously fighting. If they could be taught – but who was to teach them? Raphael? The idea alone was ludicrous. Raphael didn’t even have a sense of humor. And Gabriel – well, he could freely admit that he wasn’t a teacher, or a role model, however much he loved to teach people a lesson. Besides, he hadn’t planned on making his appearance in Heaven immediately…

Gabriel had tried and failed to shake off these thoughts. Repeatedly. He’d even allowed himself an orgy of food and artificial company. Then, he’d hunted after Famine, to blow off steam. He needed to be careful now, lest Lucifer got wind of what he was doing, and who it was, but Gabriel could easily engineer for all the deaths to seem as though no angel had interfered. After all he had plenty of practice, and it was only demons, anyway. The Horseman was easy enough to stop. Gabriel had all his powers, and he was an archangel. Famine couldn’t wake any cravings in him that he couldn’t still in an instant. That joke of a demon had no power over him.

Sadly, that also meant that cutting off his finger and watching him shrink like a raisin was less satisfying than it could have been, and Gabriel found himself back on Castiel’s cabin.

He tried to ignore the immediate happenings, and directed his attention to angelic communications. He had occasionally listened in, over the years, but really the ceaseless orders and prayers were quite boring, especially now that there was no response to the angels’ worship. Back in the day, Heaven used to ring with song, but their Father was gone and Michael had never been the same since. Still, listening in was a necessity if he wanted to keep up on the progress of the apocalypse. What he heard wasn’t particularly surprising: retreat on all fronts.

Raphael seemed to have finally realized that it was pointless trying to hold his own against Lucifer while the latter was in his true vessel and Michael was still dicking around in Heaven. Michael had always been very picky about vessels. If it had been Gabriel, he’d have chosen a temporary vessel by now, but of course Michael had to be righteous about every little thing. If no vessel that was destined for him could be found, then he’d just sit around in Heaven and have someone else do the legwork. Gabriel could have sworn that was how he had earned the title of Messenger. He’d never been very particular in terms of vessels. Sure, he had his preferences, but as long as the human soul wasn’t an entirely intolerable and humorless ass, he was fine. Hells, he’d had this one for a few centuries, now. He’d released the soul sometime in the late Middle Ages, one of those holy years. Gabriel forgot which. He had enough power to maintain his own body; it was just so annoying to create new ones.

At any rate, Raphael’s retreat was only natural, but it was time to let Castiel know. Put a bit of pressure on Dean, so this farce could finally be over.

Gabriel found Cas on a little elevation at the rear of the camp, where he was sitting at the foot of an old white oak tree, looking towards the camp. He had brought a blanket with him to sit on, and looked small, diminished, human.

“Heya, little brother.”

This time, Castiel did not seem startled. He just nodded in his direction. “Gabriel. I wondered if you would come.”

“You know me. Can’t stay away.” Gabriel made space for himself on the blanket, shoving Castiel’s feet to the side, and materialized two ice cream sandwiches – with sprinkles, of course. Castiel accepted his with a skeptical look, but didn’t hesitate taking it from Gabriel’s hand.

“Have you heard?” Gabriel asked, without further preamble.

“The call for retreat? I have.”

Of course he would have. He was a soldier, after all. Gabriel sighed and stuck his tongue into the layer of ice cream. It was messy, but he couldn’t care less. “So have you told your human yet?”

Cas tilted his head, frowning. “Dean? Told him what?”

“That you’ll be returning to Heaven, of course, bucko! You heard them. All is forgiven. This is your chance to get your grace recharged, and you won’t even have to face any consequences. It’ll be better to be up there than down here when the fight goes down, believe me.”

Cas shook his head, but didn’t make a reply for a long time, tentatively eating the sandwich. He didn’t bite right in, which was a surprise. He seemed to have learned a bit about human food, regardless of how unsophisticated Dean’s tastes were. Or maybe he’d decided he didn’t particularly like brain freezes all on his own, clever as he was. Eventually, Castiel asked, “Are _you_ going back?”

“Eh.” Gabriel followed up the ice cream with a cookie. “Not quite yet, if you catch my drift. Safer to stay out of the way until everything is over. Don’t want Michael getting the wrong idea.”

“You will hide in a pocket universe.”

“Hey! I prefer to think of it as witness protection.”

Castiel looked at the melted ice cream that had dripped onto his fingers. “Will it have ice cream? Sexual companions? Pets?”

“You know me too well, brother.”

Cas brushed the droplets off on his coat – frankly, that thing was starting to smell. It also really was a shame about the delicious ice cream, but Castiel couldn’t seem to eat it any faster. He look pensive, avoiding Gabriel’s gaze. “Human things.”

“So? They won’t be _gone_ , Cassie. They will be preserved in Heaven forever. Without all the suffering and hunger and pain.”

“I won’t abandon Dean.”

“It’s always Dean, isn’t it? Dean won’t be Dean much longer. He is the Michaelsword, Castiel, when will you finally get that into your thick head? It’s his destiny.”

“Destinies can be changed,” Castiel said, but it sounded like he was quoting rather than his own conviction.

“Yeah? Is that what he’s been telling himself? Or what you’ve been telling yourself? Like Sam changed his? Tell me, brother, how many of our brothers and sisters’ communications can you still hear? Wasn’t the call for retreat the loudest in a long time? You are a soldier of Heaven, Castiel, and you always will be. Dean is the Michaelsword. At this point, you’re both just being morons.”

“Maybe that is all it takes.” Castiel rose to his feet abruptly, tugging at the blanket until Gabriel extended his wings to float off it. “Leave, Gabriel. You aren’t being helpful.”

“Fine. Have it your way. But if you change your mind, come back out here and I’ll give you a boost.”

Castiel walked off without looking back.


	10. Floating

**Scene 2 - Floating**

Compared to his angelic lifespan, Castiel’s decision to follow Dean against all orders from Heaven, to side with the humans, to protect his Father’s creation, had been made in a split second. Castiel had believed it was the right thing. Even after learning that his Father had disappeared for good, turning his back on them, Castiel had believed in Dean. Even when he had pulled him out of Hell, Castiel had seen the brilliance of the soul of the Righteous Man, gleaming with strength and free will.

Perhaps it had something to do with his own senses dulling, but he found it painful to look at Dean now. The Dean he had Fallen for – he would have grieved for a friend. Now, all Castiel could sense was anger. After that night on the Impala’s hood, Dean hadn’t touched the car, but he and Cas had been all over the country in a mad chase after the Colt Dean believed could kill anything.

Castiel had heard of the Colt, and while he thought there might be a chance that it could, in fact, kill angels, archangels like Lucifer were another matter entirely. Even his own angel blade could do nothing, as he had been forced to explain to a very irate Dean.

They hadn’t found it, of course. “Not yet,” Dean kept saying, but it all reminded Cas rather too much of his own fruitless search. He had never thought that for an angel as himself, divinity should be such an unreachable thing – surely, to strife for the divine was human? At any rate, the only strife that seemed to keep Dean going now was anger. There was no trace of sadness. Castiel found the reaction entirely incomprehensible. After they had learned of Sam’s fate, Dean had been inconsolable for weeks. Angry, yes, but deeply saddened also. Surely Bobby, as Dean’s surrogate father, deserved the same painful act of mourning? It seemed that Dean wouldn’t admit any affection, any feelings at all apart from the burning rage. It reminded Castiel uncomfortably of Lucifer before his Fall.

Castiel desperately hoped that is was just his fading grace. He would have given much, these days, to feel like an angel again, but the alcoholic remedy of which Dean was so fond only made him feel more human. So, he experimented.

On one of their missions (failed, of course, though they managed to eliminate a nest of demons that had been left behind, and take a prisoner), Castiel went through all the magic ingredients the demons had hoarded and, when he found it, slipped a bit of frankincense into his coat.

It was strenuous to keep the coat clean, these days, too, and with sinking temperatures, it didn’t seem to warm him anymore. Castiel knew this was a sign of his increasing humanity, just like his desire for sleep, or food, but he hesitated to raise the point with Dean. It wasn’t like they had time to spare for obtaining clothing, or the money.

The incense felt appropriate. Castiel burned some on a plate in his cabin one particularly cold evening he would rather have spent in conversation with Dean, as he used to, but Dean was occupied with securing their prisoner. He hadn’t wanted Castiel’s help. “Remembered what happened last time I trusted you to draw a Devil’s Trap?”, he’d said. Of course Castiel remembered, but he also remembered that the trap had broken out of no fault of his. Uriel’s sabotage had made Alastair’s escape possible.

The frankincense made him lightheaded, and the spicy aroma reminded him of Heaven – pure sensations used to be possible only within the realms of Heaven, where he could move about in his true form. Here, on Earth, he had seen everything at a distance, its molecular construction intruding upon his senses and prohibiting any full engagement. Now, that barrier seemed to be dissolving. It was enough, for now. Castiel didn’t particularly care that he passed out on his bed eventually from pure exhaustion, his eyes watering.

It was frankincense every night after that. Castiel still found falling asleep disconcerting, but the fumes made it easier, even when he hadn’t fought with Dean. It even prompted a response from Dean, which was a pleasant surprise.

“Dude, you smell like you’ve bathed in the stuff. What are you, the fucking Catholic Church?”

“I’m an angel, Dean,” Castiel replied. It was the last time he used the word to refer to himself.

He would sometimes try to listen in on “angel radio” in the next weeks. The incense and then, when he ran out, myrrh, scavenged from spell ingredients of a coven of witches they ran into, made it easier. The smoke was only slightly psychoactive, of course, but it had been used in religious ceremonies for centuries, and if Cas inhaled the smoke deeply enough, he could understand why. He was just Cas, now. It was getting harder to remember what he was by the day, and the smoke… well. The reminder of Heaven was one thing, but the inhalation also made him feel physically light, which was close enough to remind him what it had felt like to be a multidimensional wavelength. He tended to forget the ache in his shoulders, the exhaustion, the fact that he could no longer keep himself clean, the feeling of isolation whenever he tapped into his brothers and sisters’ communication. He decided he was doing it because he thought he might find something useful, like where the Colt was. What Lucifer was doing. How the war was going (not well). Mostly, he just lay on his bed for hours and lost himself in the chatter.

When Gabriel came to him, it wasn’t exactly news to Cas. Gabriel was quite right, much of the general chatter had become faint, almost unintelligible, but the call for retreat had rung out loud and clear, and if his wings had still been what they used to be, Cas would not have hesitated to obey the call. Or maybe he would have. There was no way of knowing whether he had overcome the instinctive angelic responses or whether the pull of the order would have been so forceful that he would have abandoned Dean to his fate without a second thought. As it was, his wings felt increasingly like a heavy, dead weight. Dean had noticed something was physically wrong – or rather, he had noticed that Cas “had his panties in a twist.” Cas didn’t like the derision that accompanied all of Dean’s communication recently, but he had found it surprisingly easy to cite a headache instead of attempting to explain.

Humans seemed to suffer from headaches constantly, all those little maladies that made their existence so fragile, so fleeting. The concept of pain wasn’t foreign, not after the violence he had suffered at the hands of angels, but the sensation had been an entirely different one. Now, as his grace was fading, pain had become more immediate. He had stubbed his toe the other day, and for an instant, he was convinced it was broken. His wings weren’t precisely painful – they couldn’t be, they didn’t exist on a physical plane, but they felt… off. Sore and stiff, every movement that used to come so naturally required conscious effort. He hadn’t used them for flying in a while, since that required him to bend reality, for which he simply lacked the power. However, he used to stretch them now and again, just to enjoy his true form rising to the surface – that was now actively exhausting, and maybe the ache in his shoulder blades was a kind of tension headache. The ibuprofen Dean had given him helped. It made it easier to sleep, too.

The morning after Gabriel’s visit, Dean and Cas were sitting over a map in Dean’s cabin, trying to figure out where the demons were moving the Colt, and marking off the Croatoan hot zones. The radio that sometimes worked had revealed that the new government was taking extreme measures to contain the virus, putting whole townships under a military controlled quarantine, but Dean and Cas both knew that the virus couldn’t be stopped as easily. It didn’t spread by natural means. If it was eradicated in one corner of the country, it would inexplicably return in another. Demons were not constrained by human travel, which was also the reason that whenever someone tipped them off about an increase in demon activity in one town, by the time they got there, the demons would be gone.

“I’m sick and tired of swallowing their dust, Cas! There _has_ to be a way to predict where they are going.”

“I cannot listen to Hell’s communication. Only the demons and Lucifer will know where they are taking the Colt. Dean – it might be that Lucifer is playing with you. Maybe the Colt won’t even harm him.”

“If it couldn’t harm him, why keep it moving all over the country?”

“To distract his enemies,” Cas said. “You.”

“From what?”

“I don’t know.”

It was then that the sentry gave the alarm. Dean threw down his pen with a curse, snatching up his gun instead.

Cas followed him outside. He didn’t carry guns unless he was on guard duty, which wasn’t often. The humans who had become residents of the camp in the last weeks seemed to be wary of him, as if they could sense that he was… _other_.

There was a new arrival at the gate, the current guards – burly Adrian and Richard Pratt, father and son – almost lifting him off his feet. “No, you don’t understand! I have to speak to Dean Winchester and Castiel immediately! Let me go!” It was Chuck Shurley, the prophet, wearing a bathrobe and slippers.

“Chuck?” Dean sped up. “Let him go.”

The guards dropped Chuck back onto his own two feet and retreated back to the gate. Chuck turned around, his eyes widening in horror. “Oh no.”

“What?” Dean was still a few feet away.

“I thought there would be more time!”

“What is it?”

“I’m so sorry. Castiel, I’m so sorry!”

“What?”

Cas had stopped in his tracks, not understanding. Dean through a glance back at him, clearly at a loss. “What the hell are you on about, Chuck?”

“Just – Cas – someone – Shut your eyes! Everyone shut your eyes!”

As soon as the words were out of Chuck’s mouth, Cas felt it. The sensation was impossible to express in any human language, perhaps it was even impossible to express in Enochian. Later, Cas would wonder if this was how it had felt for Jimmy when Cas had been torn out of him. In that moment, all he felt was sudden, crushing, incomprehensible loneliness, and then pain. Pain so encompassing, so immediate that his vision whited out. Screaming – someone was screaming – _he_ was screaming, really screaming, his true form bursting through the confines of his vessel, his wings spreading in trembling agony, and escaping, dissolving at the edges, uncontainable. Things were bursting around him, a whirlwind of twigs and leaves tearing further holes into his form, and then he was falling. Falling so far, so fast, so endlessly, until he slammed back into his body and everything went black.

Later, Cas would think that through all this, he had heard his screams being echoed on the hill at the rear of the camp.


	11. Interlude from the Winchester Gospels

**Interlude from the Winchester Gospels**

It was evening, and the Prophet and the Righteous Man were in the Angel’s Cabin. And Castiel was lying on the bed, for he was deeply unconscious, and his coat had been torn to shreds. And Dean, the Righteous Man, was very angry. He spoke, “What the hell, Chuck?!” And the Prophet Chuck replied, “I thought there would be more time! I swear I thought there would be more time!”

It was then that the Righteous Man was called from outside. And Dean was wroth at the interruption, but he acknowledged his follower. And John Fitzgerald spoke, “Risa’s found someone.”

Thus, John Fitzgerald and Risa Ramoz and the Righteous Man walked to the hill that was situated behind the camp. And there they beheld the fallen form of the Archangel Gabriel, for there was little difference between him and Castiel in this matter. And the Archangel was bleeding from his ear.

The Righteous Man inquired, “The hell?”

And Risa spoke, “I saw a second flash up here and came to investigate. Found him like this.”

And John was suspicious of the Archangel and took him for a demon.

And Dean was not pleased to see Gabriel, but he held his follower back. “No demon.” And thus it was ordained that Gabriel should be taken to a supply hut and locked in until such time as they could discover what had happened.


	12. Falling

**Scene 3 - Falling**

“I really am sorry, Castiel. But I’m just… I’m just a writer. There was nothing for months. Lots of scary stuff on the news, but no… no visions. And then yesterday, all of a sudden… I should have come sooner.”

Just one voice. Why was there only one voice? Where were his brothers and sisters, what had happened to the Heavenly Host, how could humans stand it, how could everything be so _lonely –_ why couldn’t he sense the resonance of the life around him, of the souls, how could there be a voice by his side if there was no soul, how could there be birdsong if the birds weren’t _alive_ – how? _How?_

Was this punishment? Had he been taken to Heaven? It didn’t feel like Heaven – it felt very cold, barren, lonely. Cas reached inside to find his grace, such as it was – but he only found the tiniest spark. A residue, nothing more, only emptiness, black and suffocating where his core should have been. Cas tried to spread his wings, leave the vessel – nothing happened. There was a dull ache.

This wasn’t a vessel. Not anymore. This was a body. His body, and he was trapped in it. He was alone. A nucleus surrounded by life he couldn’t touch, couldn’t even feel – how _did_ humans do it? How could they always be so _alone_?

“No.” Jimmy’s voice – his voice – sounded scared. “Dean!”

“Cas?”

Was that Dean? It didn’t sound like him, but then, the voice didn’t sound alive, not without the vibrations of a soul to compliment it.

Cas opened Jimmy’s eyes. His eyes. He almost closed them again. His angelic vision was entirely gone. He couldn’t see even the faintest traces of an energy flow. Everything looked bland, lifeless. How could he have stood this cabin, before? It was entirely barren. Why hadn’t he copied Dean, invested some time in decoration rather than sigil work?

Something brushed his hand. Cas jerked away, but found that he immediately missed the contact. He looked around, wildly, and found Chuck. The prophet. There was a minuscule flicker of his soul at his core, just enough to identify him as the human his body suggested he was. Cas breathed a sigh of relief, almost collapsing on back onto the bed.

His… body felt shaky, weak, worn out. Hollowed out. “What happened?” His voice wasn’t just tired – it was different. More like Jimmy’s, higher. He no longer had a true voice to hold back when he spoke. He was… human.

Chuck looked at him, face full of pity. “The angels left. I saw it. They ran. Boarded up Heaven. They aren’t coming back.”

“Cas! Hey! You’re awake!”

Dean! And he sounded legitimately pleased, too. His soul was still the most beautiful Cas had ever seen, even though he missed its full glory with a fierce ache. He had a sudden, desperate need to reach out, to connect. He grasped at Dean’s arm, his sleeve – a lifeline. The sensation of touch was appalling, too immediate, too imprecise, but he couldn’t let go. He was so alone, so tiny, drowning. “Dean.”

“Hey, yeah, it’s me.” He really did sound like his old self, soft and caring. “How are you, Cas? You look like shit.”

Cas stared at him, and then, suddenly, something broke. He let go of Dean and laughed. The sound was wrong, jarring, his face hurt and his eyes were stinging. He turned away from Dean, self-conscious, ashamed, and waited for it to stop, because he didn’t know how to make it, and he felt like this flimsy, _mortal_ shell would burst if he did.

“Shit. Cas! Chuck–”

“I… I don’t…”

Cas shook his head, and then stopped again, because he couldn’t remember why he was doing it. He couldn’t _remember!_ “They are gone, Dean! They are all gone!” He barely could summon enough breath to speak through the laughter. “The angels… They just… flew away. All gone! The whole Heavenly Host. Heaven is… I don’t know. Gone. Closed off. Empty.”

Dean inhaled sharply, aghast. “What about the people dying out there!?”

Cas shrugged, the movement feeling too natural. “Their souls will go to Hell.” The laughter stopped. “Or else they will be stuck in the Veil.”

“They can’t be gone. I just locked Gabriel in a shed,” Dean said.

The laughter came back, painful, pulling at Cas’s esophagus. “Then he’s stuck. Like me.”

Dean looked put out. “Why?!”

“They’ve given up. Lucifer –”

“No.” Dean stood and walked out into the night and the rain Cas could hear against the roof. He didn’t follow him. He curled up on his side until the laughter stopped, and then he cried. He could hear Dean praying, shouting at the sky for hours. Offering himself up to Michael. He didn’t receive an answer. There was no one to hear him. No one but Castiel. And Gabriel, if Dean had told the truth, and if he cared to listen. Cas wished he could feel him.

It was Chuck who stayed with him through the night, not Dean, no matter how much Cas wished it to be Dean. He was used to having his prayers go unheard for a long time. Cas was still grateful for the presence. He couldn’t stop himself from trying to reach out to the angels, again and again, only to find that he had nothing with which he could do even so much. When he really concentrated, he could sense two sparks of grace – Gabriel’s – and Lucifer’s. Eventually, he swallowed the pill Chuck held out to him, and fell asleep.

He would never touch frankincense or myrrh ever again. There was no more “angel radio”.

 

The morning looked just as bleak. Cas wouldn’t have gotten up. He didn’t want to get up. He didn’t want to do anything. He wanted to take another of Chuck’s pills and lose himself. All the human needs, however, were suddenly more pressing, more immediate, more painful. It occurred to him that, one day, he would die.

Cas wouldn’t have gotten up if it hadn’t been for the anguish that resonated within him and wasn’t his own. The only connection even remotely as close he had left was Gabriel, and so, Cas went to find Dean to go and find his brother. His coat was gone, shredded when his grace burst out of his body, but Dean had found him a flannel shirt and a pair of faded jeans. Both were a little loose, but Jimmy’s old belt held the jeans in place.

Dean showed no reaction at seeing him. He looked blank, bleary eyed. He hadn’t slept. Cas didn’t bother to enquire. “I want to see my brother.”

Dean flinched at the word, but nodded, digging a bundle of keys out of his pocket. “We locked him up in the shed. There’s a cot in there. Let’s go.”


	13. Crashing

**Scene 4 - Crashing**

For a long time, Gabriel just sat in the cabin, doing nothing. Escaping from the shackles Dean – no doubt, no one else could be so stupid as to try and bind an archangel – had put on him had been easy. Not as easy as it should have been. It had cost him too much energy, and he felt… tired. His wings weren’t cooperating. It was so lonely, so silent. Everywhere around him there should have been life, or at least he should have been able to sense the magnificence of all the molecular processes going on constantly, even as he made his vessel breathe, but it was all gone. The blood, too, was disconcerting. Gabriel couldn’t remember his vessel ever bleeding before. He felt surreal. If he were human, he might have said it was like being under water, everything taking on a muffled quality, but he wasn’t constrained by human senses. He was an angel. Being under water was just the same as being in the air. Neither was a medium he should be comfortable with; the Heavenly ether was his home. Now, however, the air felt natural. Safe, even.

It was then that the pine marten appeared at his window. Or, at least, it looked like a pine marten. There shouldn’t even be one, not this far south, but the Apocalypse messed up all kinds of things, and nature was amongst the first. Besides, something was very wrong with this marten, anyway. It had no soul. It should not, could not be alive.

Gabriel wrenched it inside with the help of his grace, dismayed at how that simple action made him want to sit down. The marten let out a startled squeak and tried to wiggle away, but Gabriel had it firmly. Even up close, he couldn’t sense even an echo of a soul. It wasn’t alive.

Undead pine martens? Gabriel had seen stranger things. If this was a new scheme of Lucifer’s – animal spies were nothing new, but any demonic creation should have burned at Gabriel’s touch. There would be no harm in killing it. That would get rid of the demonic presence, if any, and Gabriel could just as easily reanimate it afterwards. He sent a spark of grace into the animal, disrupting its brain. No visible evidence of demonic possession escaped, but Lucifer had always been fond of witchcraft. Gabriel laid his hand on the animal’s head, bringing it back. He might not be able to bring humans back without pissing of a whole bunch of reapers and Death, himself, now that the Horseman were walking the earth, but an animal wasn’t important in the grand scheme of things.

The pine marten started wiggling sluggishly, not even having noticed that it was dead. Only – it wasn’t alive, either.

“Must’ve gotten it wrong.” It happened, more frequently than Gabriel liked to admit. But hey, he was a free spirit, so what if he screwed up sometimes. There was always a second chance. And so, he did it again, pulled his grace together and snuffed out the animal’s non-life. He took his time bringing it back, going by the book. Resurrection was simple enough, but with his diminished grace, maybe it was better to play it safe.

The marten jerked with a throaty bark – and still nothing!

“Oh c’mon, Gabe, pull yourself together. Third time’s the charm.”

It wasn’t. This time, Gabriel broke the thing’s neck, just in case it was resistant of grace.

It didn’t change a thing.

Gabriel let the marten race around the hut for a bit, watching its mounting panic, and willing himself to really concentrate, see if he could spot a soul after all. Maybe martens were just really unsophisticated. It wasn’t like Gabriel had paid much attention to them before.

It was no good. He went after it, and repeated the process.

And again.

And again.

“Gabriel!”

Gabriel looked up and immediately felt relief so profound he abandoned the pine marten, allowing it to escape with no memory of what had happened. “Lil’ bro!”

Cas, however, didn’t look particularly joyful. Gabriel had gotten used to his diminished presence, and now there was barely enough left to recognize him for who he was, but that wasn’t even it. The ill-fitting clothes dwarfed him somehow; he looked… fragile. He had come to a halt just inside the door, leaving just enough space for Dean to squeeze in behind him. Of course, where one was, the other never was far behind.

“What’s up?” Gabriel asked, plastering a grin on his face.

Dean scowled at him. “What is that?” He waved a hand at the pine marten scrambling to escape through the window.

Gabriel stared at the wiggling form darkly, folding his arms. “Devil spawn. I couldn’t exorcise it, so I wiped its memory. It won’t have anything to report to his masters.”

“You killed it,” Cas said.

Gabriel got to his feet, approaching him, but Cas backed away straight into Dean. Gabriel stopped walking. “It was never alive. Still isn’t.”

Castiel’s expression full of sadness. “It was just an animal, Gabriel.”

“Well, yeah – an undead one!”

“Undead animals?” Dean interjected, alarmed.

“No,” Cas said, very quietly. He looked towards Dean. “What do you see, Gabriel?”

Gabriel didn’t found the interrogation particularly entertaining. “Oh, please! Your obnoxious human, of course.”

“You can still see his soul?”

Okay, now Cas had a thing for being unnecessarily cryptic, but this was ridiculous. “Of course. Unlike that… thing, he’s – unfortunately – alive. And still not a vessel, I see. It’s too bad.”

“The angels are gone,” Dean said, and Cas’s hand suddenly bunched itself into his new shirt, going white-knuckled.

Gabriel lazily materialized his sword. “You’ll find that they aren’t. Retreat isn’t the same as giving up, bucko.”

“Can you still hear them?” Cas asked.

“I…” He couldn’t. Had to be more exhausted than he thought. Gabriel overplayed the moment with a smirk, clicking his fingers for some candy. Nothing happened – only his grace gave a disconcerting flicker and lurch, and for a moment, he was falling.

“Dean, give us a moment,” Cas said, evenly.

“Yeah, okay. Call if he does anything.”

“He is my brother, Dean.”

And then, Dean was gone, and Cas was by Gabriel’s side in two quick strides, his hands digging into Gabriel’s shoulders. He let himself be pulled into the hug, squeezing back determinedly.

The closeness was nice, Cas’s grace reaching out to him, weakly, but there, and suddenly the silence felt terribly deafening.

“Cassie…”

“They are gone. The Heavenly Host – _Heaven_ is gone.”

Gabriel closed his eyes. He had always been a master of illusions, and a master of denial. When Michael and Lucifer had begun their constant fights, he’d thought it would soon be alright. Soon. Until it really wasn’t, and he had run. And now… now…

“Dean prayed to Michael all night. They are gone.”

Gabriel pushed against Cas, even though his entire form ached with the separation. “Oh, that is outstanding. Too little, too late, eh?” He let out a laugh that was just the wrong side of nonchalant. “Who will stop Lucifer now?”

Cas’s jaw set. “Dean will. We will. There has to be a way – your blade –”

“The problem is getting close enough, Cas!”

“I know. Dean is trying to find the Colt.”

“This is suicide!”

Cas stood, staring at his sandals as if they were endlessly fascinating – worn leather, the kind you got in thrift stores because they went out of fashion at the fall of the Roman Empire. “Lucifer needs to be stopped. What choice do we have?”

 


	14. Exodus

**Scene 5 - Exodus**

“Cas, a word.”

Castiel let himself be pulled outside by Dean, taking the opportunity to swallow a painkiller. Somehow, one in the evening so he could sleep wasn’t cutting it anymore. “What is it now, Dean?”

“I want him gone.”

There was no question who he was talking about, of course. “Why?”

“I don’t owe you an explanation. I want him gone, and that’s the end of it.”

“No.”

“Fuck this, Cas. I don’t trust the guy. He still has enough juice left to wipe us out when he snaps, which could be any second. Jesus, that poor animal!”

Cas dragged in air sharply. He was avoiding Dean’s gaze, he knew, but he couldn’t look at Heaven anymore. Instead, he stared off into the trees. “Since when does Dean Winchester refuse to help people who need help?”

“I can’t have anyone in this camp I don’t trust with my life!”

To Cas’s surprise, his anger soared. After feeling so numb for most of the past week, suddenly he was fighting of an onslaught of emotions, too close, too personal, too dangerous. He bunched his hand to a fist. “ _I_ trust him. Isn’t that enough?”

“No! I have a duty to these people, Cas! I can’t have some archangel sitting around here causing mayhem! The world is going to shit, in case you hadn’t noticed!”

Cas was surprised how easily he matched Dean’s raised voice. He had shouted at his charge before, once, and with good reason, but then it had been Heavenly wrath and pain fueling him. Now, it was just the vessel, his body. “Yes, I _have_ noticed! And did it occur to you even once that maybe Gabriel could help us stop it?”

“He’s a fucking liability!”

“So you would abandon him? Is that the fearless leader you have become?”

“You like him, I get it, but we – I have other people to think of, now!”

“He won’t cause any harm, Dean! I don’t understand why you are so against him staying, letting him prove himself. You gave _me_ that chance – unless you can’t stand him being around because he is my brother and you failed yours!”

Later, Cas wouldn’t know why had had said what he had said – only that the anger had carried him away and he had known, precisely, where to hurt Dean the deepest, and the soldier in him had gone for the kill. He regretted it, fiercely and immediately, even as Dean, his charge, stared him down, his expression shutting off, and then just stalked away not saying a word. The regret didn’t fade, even though the anger did – but never fully. Cas knew that, however painful, he had spoken the truth. Dean didn’t trust Gabriel, yes, but he had seen that the angel was no threat in his current state, could even be an asset once he recovered. He was certainly more useful than Cas, and _he_ hadn’t been asked to leave. It was because Dean could not stand the thought of having brothers around him.

After Dean had stormed off, Cas looked over the camp, his eyes stinging, and ran over the whole list of people they had taken in. Couples, parents and their children, widowers, orphans, single adults. No siblings. Not one pair of them. Dean had never refused anyone charity before, but that could only mean that the situation had never arisen.

He returned to Gabriel’s bedside, waiting for the painkiller to kick in, which made him drowsy, but did nothing to settle the too human whirlwind of emotion. His eyes were burning, and his head felt as though it was about to burst, and _how do humans do this_?! But really there was only one answer. Cas could not abandon Gabriel. He had been an archangel, his powers had been unimaginable, even to a former seraph like himself. The shock of losing them – Gabriel would not survive, and Castiel could not lose the last sibling he had left. And if keeping Gabriel safe and in a position to help Dean kill the devil meant that Cas had to leave, then so be it.

He packed his bag that night, when Gabriel was sleeping, and most of the camp was, too. He knew the people on tonight’s watch quite well, better than most of the camp, anyway. Sandra and Johnny were good people, kind, and they would let him leave without much opposition. It wasn’t like he was a prisoner here. Johnny had been the one to give him the painkillers he was using, after Dean’s aspirin had failed to take the edge off.   


	15. Journey

**Scene 6 - Journey**

_Cas_. That was Gabriel’s first thought when he came to his senses, before he was distracted by the sickeningly small remainder of his grace. He used to be an archangel! He used to be magnificent, three sets of splendid wings and the power to create universes – small ones, yes, but come on! It was fantastic!

It was gone. The last day – or had it been days; he would have been sure once – were a haze. Gabriel was fairly sure that he had adapted to the new way of seeing the world by now, though it still was immensely jarring to find that the jay he could see through the window no longer had a visible soul. To him, anyway. It had been easier for Cas; he’d never had so much power in the first place, and had already been falling.

Gabriel wasn’t so sure about his new accommodation – the king-sized bed in the rear alcove of Cas’s cabin had been replaced by two basic ones, with barely a space to walk between them, one of which had been allocated to him. Gabriel didn’t know how he felt about sleeping, apart from the fact that waking up was actually a disgusting sensation, but he supposed he couldn’t convince Cas to let him have the king-size back. It’ll have to do.

At any rate, it was easier to focus on that than on the fact that his lack of grace felt as if someone had wrenched out his heart and filled the gap up with cold Jell-O. Gabriel wondered if that meant that eventually he would bleed out fully, but sleeping seemed to have recharged whatever he’d wasted before – not that the amount was anything worse mentioning. He couldn’t even get a chocolate bar! His true form was an echo, his wings a heavy, stiff weight, but mostly he felt disconnected from everything that wasn’t Cas. Which brought him back to the question where his little brother had gotten to.

Hell, Gabriel should be used to hunting for the wayward angel, but back in Heaven he had at least been able to sense the guy!

Now, he was reduced to human means of communication. And had his clothes really always been that uncomfortable? Gabriel crawled out of the bed, resisting the urge to scratch. He felt dirty. Chocolate, that was what he needed. Hot chocolate with cream and marshmallows and a generous helping of sprinkles. “Cas?”

Gabriel tried the door, finding it locked – of course, though really it was so rickety that he could have lifted it off its hinges even without angelic powers. “Come on, Cassie, don’t be like that!”

Nothing stirred. Gabriel sighed, allowing himself to be just a touch melodramatic, and looked about the cabin. It wasn’t like there was much to see, anyway. Cas hadn’t bothered putting up any personal belongings – not that he really had any – so the cabin was pretty much still one of those impersonal holiday log cabins with cheap linen and even cheaper curtains. It did smell like frankincense, but that was about the only trace of Cas’s presence. Well, that, and the little scrap of paper on the desk.

Gabriel picked it up, unfolding it. His first reaction was to let out a string of expletives he’d learned from a very vocal Norse god, and which brought Dean Winchester.

“Look at that, you’re awake.”

Gabriel pressed down on his grace to keep himself from just wasting it in one burst. “I should smite you on the spot, Winchester. I should take you to Iceland and throw you into a volcano, even if it kills me.”

Dean folded his arms, leaning against the doorframe. “Not stopping you.”

“You stubborn moron! Not only are you letting the Devil take over the planet, you also ruin everyone you touch!”

“What the hell?”

“ _Cas is gone!_ ”

Dean stared at him as if he'd grown a second head. As if he didn’t already have four. Used to have. Whatever. “What do you mean he’s gone?”

Gabriel shoved the note into his face. It was simple, short. _Farewell, brother. Help Dean._

Dean looked at it blankly. It was infuriating!

“Will you get your human ass in gear! I'm not losing the last brother I have left because you can’t make up your mind how you feel about him! He’s here now because of you! I might have been stupid and arrogant and, hell, maybe a little afraid, but Cas is only here because of you! He might have believed your cause once, but he's not stupid. He knows you have maybe a one in a million chance of actually getting close enough to Lucifer to even attempt to kill him, and maybe he does actually believe you’re defending free will, but the fact remains, he is here because of you and you are as responsible for him as I am. So help me find him, or I’ll do everything in my power to see that your world really goes to shit.”

Dean glared at him, but finally started moving. He headed out, shouting for someone or other – Gabriel had never bothered to learn any of the names around the camp. He'd only been interested in Dean and Cas, and in Dean really only because he was Michael's vessel. Of the two people who came running, however, he'd only seen one before – the other, he still recognized.

“Saint Chuck! What a surprise!”

Dean rounded on him, furious. “You can either stop being a dick or I’ll put you into a ring of burning holy oil and leave you to rot while I drag Cas back here. What’ll it be?”

Gabriel gave his best fake innocent smile and pretended to zip his mouth shut. He really had no idea what Cas saw in this particular human.

“Who is he?” the prophet asked. He sounded just as confused as every other human Gabriel had ever visited as messenger of Heaven. People _never_ recognized him.

“Gabriel. Former archangel,” Dean said before Gabriel could open his mouth.

“Hey! Still an archangel, thank you very much. My wings night have been clipped, but that doesn’t make me human.”

Dean’s jaw clenched. “Cas is.”

“No, don’t be an idiot. Of course he isn’t. He doesn’t have a soul.”

“Another angel?” the other guy asked. His name was John, or James… something. “He safe?”

Dean’s frown deepened. “We're working together, Fitzgerald. Who was on night duty?”

The human reluctantly looked away from Gabriel. He was nondescript, really, just another one of these soldier-y types Dean seemed to get along with so well. “Uh, Johnny and Sandra, I think.”

Dean closed his eyes. “Of course.”

“Dean – what’s going on?” Chuck asked tentatively.

“Cas is gone, Chuck. We’ll have to get him back.”

 

It was almost two weeks before they found him. Two weeks of traveling in an increasing radius around the camp, avoiding Croatoan hot spots and demons, which Gabriel found he could sense still as clearly as when he’d been a full-fledged angel. It was ugly, life on the road with Dean Winchester. Purpose driven and full of terse silences, dirty and really very uncomfortable. Gabriel was used to a certain level of luxury, and yes, he’d been aware that it was luxury, but he’d at least hoped for a bed and a shower every day, rather than sleeping in a car and dumping a bucket of icy river water over his head after five days of generating musk. ´He could endure. Finding Cas was more important.

When they actually did, it was because the car Cas had stolen from the camp – and when did he learn to drive, even – had broken down, and Cas had found cover in a nearby abandoned farmhouse. They were fairly close to a hot zone, the area had either been evacuated or abandoned, but at least the Croats hadn’t ventured as far. That, at least, meant that Cas hadn’t been injured, but he was far from well.

He’d picked up a new habit.

Okay, yes, Gabriel had experimented back in the days. He’d tried everything, just like he tried every possible food item, but he had been an angel back then. Nothing he did to his vessel – or anyone else did to his vessel, really – had any lasting effect. Now, everything was different, but he could still recognize the smell of weed.

“What the hell, Cas!”

Gabriel thought Dean really, really had no right to get angry. He just walked up to Cas and pulled the joint out of his unresisting fingers. Cas, for his part, completely ignored him, and send an entirely unnatural smirk at Dean. “So what, fearless leader? Have you changed your mind?”

“Don’t call me that! What are you now, a junkie?”

Cas sighed, looking at the joint Gabriel had just squashed underfoot in a fit of anger. Gabriel was still trying to come to terms with this human brand of emotions – too close, too volatile, too painful.

“What do you want me to say to that, Dean? I mean, I’m not… My powers are gone.”

Dean ground his teeth, his hands clenched to tight fists. “So what? You can still fight. I need every man I can get.”

Cas didn’t look at him, didn’t reply to him, his eyes fixing instead on Gabriel as if he was seeing him for the first time. Maybe he was. He was stoned, after all. Gabriel pulled him into a hug, ignoring the surprised squeak and the stink.

“You’re coming with us, Cassie. No buts. I’m not losing you.”

Cas endured the hug stiffly, his gaze gliding back to Dean with a grin that never reached his eyes. “You have changed your mind.” And still, even with his tongue tripping over the words, Gabriel could hear the reference his brother held for the human who didn’t deserve it. He wasn’t sure if Dean could.

Dean just scowled. “Let’s get outta here before the Croats turn up.”

 


	16. Homecoming

**Scene 7 - Homecoming**

For a while, Cas felt like he was flying again. He knew it wouldn’t last – couldn’t last – but it was harder to care or feel bad about it when he was high. He tried not to overanalyze it. Gabriel had wanted to know when he had started “using”, but Cas wasn’t sure what to answer. Maybe it had started only after he had left the Camp for a little under a week, and had found the pack of weed in the car he’d stolen. He had never before experienced such loneliness, such hunger, and fear, coupled with the certainty that he had nothing left to live for. Alone, and practically human, he had no chance against Lucifer. He had formed a vague idea to try finding the Colt Dean was so desperately and futile searching, and bringing it back to him. To be useful, somehow, while remaining away so Dean could have Gabriel’s assistance – Gabriel, who still had powers, and an archangel’s sword. But when his car had broken down, he just hadn’t found the energy to move.

It was easier, back in the camp, around Gabriel. Around Dean, too, even though they rarely spoke to each other outside of planning missions. Gabriel was the one he spend most time with now, or Chuck, though the prophet’s nervous nature and the ceaseless apology in his eyes whenever he was around either him or his brother was exacerbating.

Gabriel made a point of sticking around. Instead of moving to his own cabin, he insisted on sharing Cas’s, and began to collect knick-knacks for it on supply runs. Once, he found a whole box of candy, and the whole cabin floor was filled with wrappers. Cas had liked the colors, but of course the mess of wrappers couldn’t stay. What stayed was the bead curtain Gabe dug up somewhere, the pillows he brought back with him whenever he could, the little statue of a wolf with intricate pattering and the action figure dressed in black and green and gold that Gabriel found hilarious for some reason, but which he refused to explain to Cas. He also found a little chest, in which he gathered candy.

It wasn’t unlike Cas’s stash, only that his was under the lose floorboard under his bed. He’d struck a deal with Johnny, who actually seemed to like him a little, and they shared whatever they could bring back. Sandra joined them, too, sometimes. Cas wasn’t sure if they knew who – _what_ – Gabriel and him had been, but he found them both friendly and kind. Sometimes, they would gather around the fireplace in the evening and Cas would talk to them. Sometimes, he spoke about how it had felt to be an angel, but Johnny and Sandra seemed to assume he was speaking about a high. Or a meditative trance. They didn’t seem to distinguish between the two, which Cas found confusing at first, but which soon seemed natural. Sometimes, other people joined them, too – women, mostly. Cas knew they were still searching for the divine, some sort of salvation in religion, but he didn’t care what they wanted. He talked, and they listened, and that was enough.

Gabriel barely interacted with the inhabitants of the camp at all. Sometimes, he would flirt with a woman or other, but he never went any further with it. Cas envied the ease with which Gabriel acted human, but he also knew that his brother would never admit that he only could because he was still an angel. Gabriel would not be sitting across from him now, chipper, if a bit grumpy through the lack of sugar, if he had lost all his powers, Cas was sure. Sometimes, in the evenings, Gabriel would rant and rant about what he _used to be able to do_. Cas usually tried to be stoned by then. He found his brother’s voice, even his human voice, the voice of his vessel, soothing, but he couldn’t bear listening to the words.

Worst was Dean. Always Dean. Cas could see blood under his fingernails which he had been unable to scrub off – didn’t care? Forgot? He never asked where it was from, or where Dean had been all night when they weren’t out on a mission and he couldn’t hear him in the cabin next door. Cas still knew what was really happening in the isolated hut at the edge of the camp. They could all hear the screams. He had known, on some level, since they brought in the first demon prisoner. He also knew that they had since also captured Croats. Who had once been human. He had fought with Dean about that, shortly after they had gotten back. Dean had called him a useless hippie, and that was that.

 

“You’re saying we should just abandon the one chance we have?” Dean demanded, angry.

Gabriel drummed his fingers on the desk, impatient. “I am saying, bucko, that it’s not the only chance. Nor your best one. Killing the Devil is a ludicrous plan. You might have a chance of shoving him back into his cage.”

“Just so someone else can pull him back out?”

“Won’t happen. The angels are gone. They’re not coming back, and it doesn’t work without them.”

“Gabriel is right,” Cas said.

Dean threw his hands up in frustration. “Jeez, say that now, Cas, after we’ve wasted almost three years hunting after the damn Colt!”

“It _was_ our only lead. I didn’t know about the rings.”

“Fine,” Dean said, with venom. “We’ll go after the rings on the side. Kill two Horsemen. Right. But it’s going to be your responsibility.” Dean pointed his finger at Gabriel. “And I’m not giving up on the Colt.”

“Meaning you won’t stop torturing,” Gabriel said, with derision. He clearly hadn’t had anything sweet that day yet.

Cas dug his little pill bottle out and swallowed… something.

 

 


	17. Written

**Act IV**

**Scene 1 - Written**

Sometimes, Cas would sit outside in the cold, a blanket wrapped around his shoulders, and stare off into nothingness. He never looked up – not anymore. There was no guidance to be had in Heaven, no help, not anymore. He usually climbed up on the roof for it, the weather and freezing cold be damned, and Dean had already given up trying to dissuade him from these foolish escapades. If Cas got ill, it wasn't Dean's fault – or at least, that was what he told himself. Gabriel wasn’t sure if Cas had even listened.

He certainly hadn’t listened to Gabriel when he had come down with a cold; instead, as soon as he was recovered, he was up on the roof again. It was lucky that Gabriel had just enough grace left to stave off the pneumonia. Gabriel had asked him once what the hell was so damned fascinating up there. It wasn't like Camp Chitaqua was a beehive in winter – people tended to congregate in the building and around the tent they had pitched up over the main fireplace, not walk around the grounds. Apart from the sentries, there was barely any soul visible, and the softly falling snow didn’t appeal to animals, either, and they stayed out of sight. But apparently Cas didn’t even look for them. He had hesitated for the longest time when Gabriel had asked him, like he always did when he’d rather not give any answer at all, but in the end he had given in with a sigh.

“I’m narrating.”

“Come again?”

“I’m narrating my memories of Heaven. Of our brothers and sisters. Of you and I. Of creation, of evolution, of history. Of the beauty of Earth and humanity. Of everything.”

“To whom?”, Gabriel asked, perplexed.

“To Dean.”

“You record them?” Gabriel had never seen Cas with a recording device, but that didn’t mean he didn’'t have one. Gabriel had also never seen Cas with a syringe, but he knew for a fact –

“No.”

“Write them down?” Surely he would have noticed any paper journals about the place? They were harder to hide than syringes. Besides, it wasn’t the first time he’d climbed up on the roof with two mugs of hot chocolate to tempt Cas down and back into the warmth before he caught his death. Literally.

Cas just shook his head, avoiding Gabriel's gaze. His voice had gone low, quiet. He was sober, or nearly so. “No.”

“But then...”

“I know. Sometimes I think I just like to do the talking. Sometimes I think he's here with me. He never is.”

Gabriel felt his heart clench, and tried to ignore the impulse to wrap Cas up in a hug. Too emotional, too personal, too _human_. “Hey, Cassie, let’s get inside, okay? Grab some food?”

Cas let himself be dragged off the roof, limbs stiff with cold, but Gabriel knew very well that he wouldn’t eat a whole lot. The drugs had killed his appetite, and maybe not eating made him feel more angelic. It only made Gabriel feel sick. There was a honey-sweetened porridge waiting for them, but Cas only pocked around in it with his spoon, his expression carefully blank.

 

Gabriel never brought up Cas’s unwritten journal again, but he never forget about it either. When he found Cas staring into nothingness, stoned or tired or burned out after fighting with Dean, again, he would wonder, sometimes, what Cas was telling him. Whether he was speaking of the untouched beauty of the Earth before time, or reciting Neanderthal poetry that no longer had meaning nor audience, or whether he was speaking of Heaven, of the Garden, or of the spaces created by the myriad of souls, and his heart ached.

Gabriel could have sworn that he didn’t use to feel these kinds of things before, but he also knew that he would have been wrong. What else had it been that had driven him from Heaven in the first place if not this deep-cutting anguish he felt radiating off the only brother he really had left? He wondered if Lucifer understood what had happened. If that was the reason why the death toll was sky-rocketing, why the demons they captured had a desperate, nervous demeanor about them. He knew now that there could be nothing but death for Lucifer, if they won, and eternal loneliness if they lost. Gabriel found himself wishing they would succeed, for Lucifer’s sake, but the Colt remained as elusive as ever and unless he somehow managed to manifest his blade, their only hope were the rings. Not that it was looking likely that they would be able to stop Pestilence at this point, not with his ever increasing power whenever another poor soul fell victim to the Croatoan virus.


	18. Fated

**Scene 2 - Fated**

When they eventually found Pestilence, he was busy experimenting in a sunny seaside resort he had kept untouched by the apocalyptical devastation like the one that surrounded Camp Chitaqua for miles and miles. It was only a matter of time, of course – Pestilence’s presence alone was testimony that the peace was shattering, and even if they killed him now, the Croatoan virus had progressed too far to be stopped. With Pestilence gone, it would swallow up this area, this petri-dish, in no time. It seemed ludicrous to Cas to see people on vacation, but it was easy enough to go undercover as new age meditation instructor.

It felt like a completely different world. The humans here had either fled or chosen to ignore the ruin that was coming over their world. Perhaps, they were a bit like Cas, only that their drug was sunlight, the beach and a cocktail, and the pleasure of walking around with barely any clothing. Cas saw hollow looks on several of them, and maybe he had just gotten good at spotting that kind of thing.

He had sex that first night. With Gabriel staking out in front of the surveillance monitors with Dean after Cas had let them into the hotel complex, he was actually alone, and he hated it. When a woman from his group had knocked on the door, looking for some form of connection much like he was, he hadn’t turned her down. He idly wondered later whether he would have if he’d been sober. Or whether he would have had this experience a long time ago if he hadn’t had the reassurance of Gabe’s grace nearby at all times. Losing his virginity might once have been deserving of more of a recognition, but now it was just another transgression in a bottomless pit of sins.

He didn’t speak of it the next day. Not to Gabe, who was shooting him curious looks, and most importantly not to Dean. It was no secret that Dean slept around at the camp, but somehow Cas was sure that Dean wouldn’t approve. Not that Dean’s approval was given at all these days, and least of all to Cas.

Dean’s latest demon had been quite correct, it turned out – Pestilence was in the hotel’s extensive wellness staff. In charge of physical therapy, in fact. Cas was sure he could get close without exciting suspicion. His grace was a remainder so minuscule that the Horseman would ignore it as evidence of former angelic possession, but at the same time, it might afford some form of protection from his powers.

“This is insane, Cas!”

“Well, do you have a better idea? We can’t let you get too close. You’re the only angel left on earth that still feels like one!” Cas shot back at his brother, not missing a beat.

Gabriel flinched, shrinking just slightly. He had a careless, arrogant streak even as semi-human, but his lack of power and the abandonment that Cas, too, felt so keenly every moment they were apart was his vulnerable point. “Fair enough. Take Dean-o.”

“I’m right here, you know,” Dean growled, stalking around the room in tiny circles. “What can the guy do?”

“Pretty much use any illness you can think of, and a whole bunch that don’t exist, to kill you,” Gabriel explained. “He’s methodical. Where do you think the Croatoan virus came from?”

Dean nodded, grimly. Not that his expression changed to much else anymore. “So if I go in, I’m dead, but if I let Cas go alone, so is he, and I have to go anyway.”

“Why, fearless leader, I didn’t know you cared,” Cas said, acidly. It had been a while since he’d had his last hit. He had to maintain at least a semblance of sobriety to avoid blowing his cover. Thankfully, if he was just a little high, just to take the edge off, it was put down to spirituality, but he really hadn’t planned on sticking around here for so long. It was easy enough to pick stuff up in doctors and pharmacies that had been abandoned or overrun, but in this too perfect picture of normalcy, he hadn’t been able to fill up his stash. He was running out.

Dean, as always, ignored the barb. “Normal day, then. I’ll take my chances. Gabe, you stay at the sidelines, and stay out of it unless things go pear-shaped, clear?”

“Aye aye, captain,” Gabe said, with a salute that was no less mocking than Cas’s title – but that was just Gabe.

 

It felt strange to be walking this close beside Dean again, but pretending to be helping a hotel guest who’d twisted his knee had been deemed the easiest way of getting into the physiotherapy area of the complex without causing suspicion. Once they were inside one of the consulting rooms, Dean immediately took the lead. Of course. By now, Cas didn’t even bother rolling his eyes, he just accepted the gun Dean offered him and stayed just behind him.

They didn’t make it far. Just down the corridor, they found the unfortunate assistant who had led them into the consulting room before going off to fetch the doctor, choked on their own blood, or vomit, or both. It was as they stepped over the corpse that Dean coughed, his lungs rattling, and Cas felt a lightheadedness that had nothing to do with drugs or withdrawal. A few steps on, Dean tumbled into him. Cas nose was bleeding. And then Dean collapsed, and Cas, trying to catch him, fell down with him. Everything went black.

“Why, hello, Dean. And you… Castiel, isn’t it? How nice to meet you.”

Cas woke up with a groan, smelling vomit and feeling horrendous. He could see his hand, just about, but his fingers didn’t use to be blue, did they?

“Ah yes, how do you like the symptoms of alcohol poisoning? Of course it’s not, just some concoction of illnesses I mixed together just for you. And you, Dean, let’s see. Syphilis, of course. Scarlet fever… Uh, meningitis. That can’t be fun.”

If Cas had actually been able to move, he might have punched Pestilence. As it was, he tried to push himself up, get a look at Dean – Dean, who was dying!

“You really can’t stop me, you know.” Pestilence strode between them, looking down on Cas. “Fascinating. There is not a speck of angel in you, is there?”

Cas didn’t need to see Pestilence’s face to know he was smirking, and it was enough. Maybe he was a useless stoned hippie, now, but he could still do this. He didn’t remember later how he’d gotten to his feet – in fact, he didn’t remember much at all, but blurry vision and hallucinations weren’t new to him, not anymore, and Pestilence’s ring was _right there._ “Maybe just a speck!”

He wasn’t sure, later, when he came to his sense in the backseat of their car, the anxious face of his brother hovering over him, what had made him say that. He wasn’t an angel anymore, not even partly. Not like Gabriel. There was still a _lack_ where his grace had been that never went away, and he could sense some things, but all together he was worth less than the average human psychic. But for Dean, he had always been able to go above and beyond his nature.

Gabriel must have read something of his thoughts on his face – he was getting rather good at it, or maybe Cas was getting careless, or maybe Gabe had just one more angel power left he never talked about. At any rate, his face went from concerned to sad. “Cassie…”

Cas waved him off. “Leave me alone. Let’s get out of here.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Gabriel pocketing Pestilence’s ring as he slid into shotgun.

A week later, they were sitting around the conference table and staring at three rings, as diverse as the Horsemen they used to belong to. “I have an idea where to find Death,” Gabriel said.

 

 


	19. Interlude from the Winchester Gospels

**Interlude from the Winchester Gospels**

And so it was that the Righteous Man and Castiel and Gabriel travelled to Chicago to find Death. After great exertions, Dean left his companions behind to encounter the Horseman at a restaurant. And when he returned, he was pleased, for he had gained the Horseman’s ring. And his companions, who had worried for his safety, were perplexed. So, Dean spoke, “He just gave it to me.”

And the Righteous Man did not tell his companions of the encounter. And thus, Castiel and Gabriel remained oblivious to the condition Death had given, and to the promise Dean had made without hesitation: To do whatever it took to kill the Devil.

 


	20. Circling

**Scene 3 - Circling**

Getting the rings had been surprisingly easy. Too easy, even, as far as Gabriel was concerned, though neither Cas nor Dean liked to bring up Pestilence. Finding Lucifer, however, was another thing entirely. Besides, Dean was still obsessed with catching up with the Colt, first, just in case the rings didn’t work.

Sometimes, Gabriel wasn’t sure whether Dean loved or hated Castiel, as he wasn’t sure if Dean loved or hated his own brother. After all, the world had gone to shit because Sam had given up, given in. Gabe couldn’t blame him, of course. Lucifer had been a manipulative douchebag even back in Heaven, which was handy enough if you had him on your side, but a real pain if he was set on bringing the human race to extinction. It was a shame that Luci had been so blinded by his pride that he’d never learned to appreciate the finer things humanity had to offer, but hell, if this had been the Heavenly plan all along, it was hardly the Morningstar’s fault. God had allowed the Heavenly Host to wash Earth clean before – Sodom and Gomorrah came to mind, not that it had done much good in the long run. Whether it was through Lucifer’s vengeance or collateral damage, humanity’s last hour had begun. Sometimes, Gabriel didn’t know if he loved or hated Lucifer, and he supposed he could understand Dean in that. But Dean and Cas, that was something different.

They weren’t related, not even distantly, and if Gabe hadn’t known what his brother had given up for Dean, and how the two of them clung to each other in the darkness, he wouldn’t have doubted that they hated each other’s guts. Cas seemed set on getting Dean’s hackles up these days, and Dean’s contempt seemed to ooze out of him like dark, sticky goo, so thick it practically had a physical presence. Sometimes, Gabe really didn’t know, but on his better days he hoped for Cas’s sake – hoped that Dean would finally hate him so much that he could let him go, because right now, that didn’t look like it was happening, even with Cas sprawled out in the dirt, fingering his reddening cheek, and Dean still standing over him, fuming, the open palm still half raised.

It didn’t go further than that. Though no one dared to intervene – no one came in between Dean and Cas, not even Gabe – and Cas’s infuriating grin made Gabe think his baby bro had deserved the punch, Dean just dropped his hand and stalked away. The crowd dispersed, but Cas was still sitting on his backside in the dust by the time Gabriel came over. He’d like to think that he could pull off a nonchalant swagger, but the fact was, he used to do that when he was still a fully charged angel. As quasi-human with no standing in the camp whatsoever, he didn’t dare. Not really. Not with Dean already fuming, and if he loved-hated Cas, he liked Gabe even less.

Gabriel offered Cas his hand, but the other ignored him, climbing laboriously to his feet.

“You should have cheek looked at, lil’ bro.”

Cas, as usual, ignored him, and instead walked straight past him back to their hut, disappearing from view with the clacking of the bead curtain. Gabriel wouldn’t be Gabriel if he were so easily deterred. He followed, leaning against the doorframe casually while Cas busied himself at his desk – rolling a joint with expert, but shaking hands. Gabriel found Cas’s new set of human expressions confusing – still, after all these months – but he knew agony when he saw it, and Cas’s eyes were swimming with it.

Eyes weren’t windows into a soul, Gabe knew that for a fact, but he understood why the humans had gotten the impression. Cut off from any other signs of his brother’s distress, let alone the fact that they weren’t even sure whether they had a soul, the two of them, Cas’s eyes had suddenly become a mirror of truth, showing the pain even when his face was split in a grin and a laugh.

“You’re grieving him,” Gabriel said, and it wasn’t a question. He just wondered why it had taken him so long to notice. “You’re in mourning, and he isn’t even dead. Yet.”

Cas’s hand had crushed the joint in his fist, the contents falling to the table through his fingers, and Cas just pressed his palm down on top of them. “Shut up, Gabe.”

“It’s true, though. Cas, why must you put yourself through this?” Gabriel walked over to lean against the desk. He didn’t do touchy-feely, but he had been watching Cas’s self-destruction for long enough. Now that he finally had the key to its reasons, well… “It’s not worth it, brother.”

“That’s not for you to decide.”

Gabriel shrugged. “Eh, maybe not. But I’m speaking from experience here. Do you see me pulling myself to pieces because of Kali?” He hadn’t planned on telling Cas what he’d been up to since leaving, but there were only so many car rides and meals and sleepless nights Gabe could bear in silence. So, he had talked about the gods, and Kali, of course. He might have boasted a bit, but it was less fun when Cas had moved so far from the innocent little angel he used to be. “No. And she _is_ dead.”

Cas’s face suddenly scrunched up in pain, and he dropped his head into his hands. “Leave me alone.”

“No chance.”

“He might as well be!”

The sudden fury startled Gabriel, upsetting his precarious perch on the edge of the table. He stumbled back. “What the hell?!”

“His soul used to be the most beautiful I had ever seen – on any being! Bright and perfect and pure, even when I dragged him out of Hell, even sullied with the grime of the pit, it was flawless! Do you have any conception of what it was like to find such a thing in _Hell_ , Gabriel? Do you have any idea how it felt to cradle it in my arms and bear it upwards, back to Earth? Even back in his body, I used to be able to tell _at a glance_ when he felt guilty, or hurt, or tired, or _happy_ , and that’s all gone, now! I can barely tell he’s _Dean_ at all, do you understand! And the way he’s been acting – do you know what he’s been doing?!”

Gabriel pursed his lips. “Yeah, I know.” Angels were no strangers to torture, of course, and Gabriel had often thought that his brothers and sisters really needed to get off that particular high horse, and he hadn’t seen anything wrong with grilling a few demons, heck, he’d even encouraged it. It was the only way to keep taps on the Horsemen without being constantly on the road, and it wasn’t like the demons didn’t deserve it. Only it wasn’t just demons anymore, was it?

The inhabitants of the camp kept away from the single, separated hut near the electronic fence they’d put up for protection, all but Dean (and Cas, because there was nowhere Dean went that Cas didn’t go also), but Gabriel still knew. They probably all knew, or suspected, where the Croats they captured ended up. It didn’t happen often, but it happened.

“He was – is – was – I don’t know anymore!” Cas ran a hand through his hair. “He was my charge, Gabe, and it feels like I’ve lost him. It feels like I failed him, like he’s gone, only he is right there, but I can’t tell! I can’t tell whether it’s still _Dean_ , because it doesn’t feel like him anymore! He barely even seems alive…” Cas let himself fall back onto his bed, staring at the ceiling.

Gabriel knew it was only a matter of time before he went for his more powerful drugs. Absinthe seemed to be his new favorite beverage lately, anyway, difficult as it was to find. Cas… indulged.

 


	21. Failing

**Scene 4 - Failing**

It was 2013, spring. It was warm, and the ground was dry, and they were running from Croats, racing back to the car where Gabe was keeping the engine idling. The ground was good for running when Cas’s foot snagged on a root and he fell. His vision whited out momentarily with the pain, and he had heard something snap. He knew there was no way he would be walking, let alone running, on that foot again, if he even managed to get back to his feet before the Croats caught up.

He tried. Of course he tried. He was high, and he didn’t really give a damn about pain anymore, and he really didn’t want to die, not like that – but his shoes were not made for running in the first place, and they offered no hold. There was no way he could put weight on his foot.

Suddenly, Dean was there, right there, yanking Cas to his feet, and for a moment, Cas thought he could see the old Dean shining through. It occurred to him later that that was probably the only reason they made it, that small proof that Dean was still _Dean_ , or could be. Bitter, galling hope.

Somehow, Chuck had become irreplaceable as the guy who knew everything there was to know about the current inventory of the camp. Cas sometimes thought that he could have done the job just as well – it was simple, really: they lacked everything. But Chuck also doubled as medical assistant, especially where Cas and Gabe were concerned. Not that Gabe frequently needed him, he had something of a knack for never getting injured, but Cas appreciated the ex-prophet’s knowledge of all kinds of medical remedies and their interactions. Chuck never hid his nervous disapproval of Cas’s self-medication, but at least he didn’t try to meddle. Not like Dean or Gabe.

Cas wouldn’t have needed him to tell him that the foot was broken. It had swollen grossly during the car ride, every bump causing pain that penetrated his haze of drugs, and he was barely conscious by the time Dean lifted him up in bridal carry and deposited him on Cas’s bed, or else he would have appreciated the irony a whole lot more. Of course, Dean was gone by the time that Chuck arrived, though Gabriel was still hovering around the door.

Chuck couldn’t do anything much until the swelling went down, so he found an icepack wrapped in a towel for Cas to put his foot on, and left. Gabriel hovered around awkwardly for a while longer, but eventually got tired of being snapped at and left Cas alone to try and reach his emergency supply under his pillow without moving his foot.

It was the most frustrating experience, and for the first time in a long time – pills notwithstanding – Cas almost felt like an angel again. Impatience was so familiar, the one of the few feelings the angels had been permitted back in the day, and Cas was impatient. But that was as far as it went. He should have been able to heal such an injury in seconds. He tried getting very stoned, but the feeling of uselessness didn’t go away.

It got worse when Gabriel popped his head back into the hut several hours later. “Uh… We don’t exactly have stuff for a cast.”

“Fantastic,” Cas said, his voice without infliction.

“Chuck’s going to try and pack your foot with clay, stabilize it until we can fix up some kind of special shoe.”

Cas stared at the ceiling, wishing he could at least see the sky – only to change his mind about that immediately. “I don’t suppose you can just…” He clicked his fingers.

“No. Sorry, lil’ bro. You’ll have to do this one on your own.”

Cas barked a laugh, burying the reminder of his lack of grace under the humorless sound. Of course, while Gabriel could heal major injuries to himself just fine enough for first aid, he had no energy left for anyone else. It had been the same for Cas, when he was still Falling. Gabe didn’t talk about how the Fall was affecting him, exactly, but Cas had a feeling it was getting gradually worse. Gabe was getting more short-tempered by the day, and his stash of candy was emptying faster than Cas’s stash of drugs. How the sugar and the endorphins that came with it could be enough for Gabe, Cas wasn’t sure, but if anything else was going on, Gabe hid it well under his constant prying into Cas’s affairs.

Gabe cleared his throat, interrupting Cas’s mounting hysteria. “I’m mean, just sit it out.”

‘Sitting it out’ was pretty much all Cas did in the following three months. Eventually, they managed to find him some crutches and fabricate a shoe/bandage that offered at least some support, but the pain of moving around was agonizing, and Cas would have preferred to stay in his cabin and get stoned, or drunk, or both, but after a month of doing exactly that, Dean put him back on the guard duty roster. Cas didn’t know what he hated more, lying in his cabin being unable to do anything because of either pain or drug, or sitting outside in all kinds of weather, enduring Johnny’s idle drugged chatter, or Sandra’s looks, which were always laden with lust Cas couldn’t be bothered to take advantage of. He was fighting with Gabriel enough about his drug habit already, no need to keep adding another human sin to the repertoire. Not that Gabe was such a poster child of heavenly behavior, and Cas knew for a fact that he had done his share of flirting around the camp, though Gabe seemed to enjoy the chase more than the capture. Dean – Dean didn’t seem to enjoy much of anything anymore these days. Sometimes, because he had nothing better to do, Cas would watch him from afar, bustling about the camp and getting missions together. Watched him kill infected camp residents without blinking, or come out of his torture chamber splattered with blood. It was never his own, and Cas didn’t know if he was relieved about that.

 


	22. Waiting

**Scene 5 - Waiting**

Cas really was no fun like this. He’d been a depressing sight even before breaking his foot, but this really was taking it too far. Gabriel was sick and tired of the monosyllables, and he was sick and tired of the drugs. He’d almost stepped on a syringe _twice_ , and what the hell was it even that Cas was shooting up? He never showed any signs of hallucinations, but with the cocktail he was cooking up and putting into his body, he could not be lucid. Gabe was surprised, frankly, that he hadn’t overdosed yet. Now there was a scene he didn’t want to stumble into.

Gabriel found himself reminded of why he didn’t much like most parts of his family. It didn’t help that it was Cas, who had once been Castiel; he was just getting on Gabriel’s nerves. And there wasn’t even anything sugary around to drown his sorrow in. He never understood how Cas could have a constant supply of drugs when even so much as a sugar cube was an unobtainable commodity. It wasn’t like Dean particularly cared about procuring the drugs, and since Chuck had taken over their inventory, there was no way Cas was secretly syphoning off essential medical supplies.

Gabriel had thought he would like Chuck when the prophet had first been introduced to him, but now he found that he really couldn’t stand being around the guy. He was always apologizing to him – or Cas, for that matter – just out of the blue, he would burst out with an apology, one of those sincere ones you really couldn’t ignore, but after the millionth time, and without even knowing what he was apologizing for, Gabriel just parroted it back to him in increasingly acidic and irritated voices. But come on, the guy was the reason there was no chocolate! He never believed Gabriel when he told him that it was an essential just as much as tampons and tinned food.

Of course, with Cas laid up, or stuck in a chair, as it were, Dean had taken to pulling Gabe along on every single supply mission, even though his grace was only a glorified demon detector and Gabe couldn’t have smote anything but the smallest animals no matter how hard he tried. One would think that he should be able to grab a candy here and there, but no, Dean always called him back when he so much as set a foot towards the supermarket aisles. And yet, Cas never ran out of drugs. That really wasn’t fucking fair.

It wasn’t fair either that he was stuck in one cabin with the Cas and had to listen to his screams at night. Gabe only needed about three hours, not that he mentioned that to anyone so Dean didn’t get the idea to put him on guard duty – no thanks! At any rate, he had to wait out the remaining five-ish of Cas’s, each night, every night, and no night went by without screaming. Sometimes, Cas would wake himself up, or maybe it was the pain, and he would always go for the absinthe, then, if it was available – if it wasn’t, there was always other alcohol, but they had found that cheap beer was harder to loot than luxurious liquors. Nobody cared about luxury if they just wanted to drown their apocalyptic daily sorrows. Absinthe was a classy drink, really, but Gabe had to fake sleeping if he wanted to avoid awkward non-conversation, so he never got to even watch the alcohol burn. At least there was no sugar for that, either, or Gabe might have considered stealing it. Fuck knew what Cas was using.

Sometimes, it was easier to spend the night in the cabin or tent of someone who’d been susceptible to his flirting. Gabe didn’t particularly care who it was. He enjoyed the chatting, but never went any further. It didn’t seem right, somehow, so he faked an excuse. That was probably the reason why no one in the camp seemed to like him very much. That, or his pranks, if he could pull them of, which was seldom enough, but at least for a moment, he had something to laugh. It was worth it for the shine in Cas’s eyes when he’d dumped a bucket of wet earth out over Dean.

 


	23. Breaking

**Scene 6 - Breaking**

Gabriel, always righteous and keen on what humans used to call divine justice – not that there was ever anything divine about it, even if Cas used to agree that some of the people Gabriel went after in the olden days had it coming – that Gabriel became downright cruel when the mood struck him now that he was human or as good as. They’d never been able to figure out where the line actually had been drawn. Cas felt human enough, but sometimes, there would be a flicker of _something_ , and for a moment or two, hope would surge through him like a poison, gone the next instant and taking a bit of him with it every time. It was easier to bury it all in a haze of psychedelics and chalk it up as hallucination – which brought him to the point why Gabriel was downright cruel.

“What the fuck! What the fuck, Gabe!”

“Uh, uh, language, little fledgling.” Gabe wagged a finger, his hands covered in cuts and scrapes, bleeding freely but unheeded.

“Get out! Get the fuck out!”

“I was just having fun.”

“This is not fun! This isn’t fun! Fuck!” Cas ran a hand through his hair, trying to ignore that it was getting too long, again, that it was greasy and unwashed, again, and dove under his bed for the box. _The_ box – his lifeline. He needed – It wasn’t there. “Where is it?! Gabe, where is it!”

Gabriel had the audacity to shrug, studying his hands. “Dumped it all into the latrine. It’s a disgusting habit, Cassie.”

Cas didn’t remember his response. He remembered hurling something at Gabe, who just ducked away with a laugh, piercing and cruel in Cas’s ears, and then everything was a haze. He remembered…

 _Remember the Heavenly punishment when they dragged you back, remember what they did to you then, Castiel, how they dug into your being and took you apart and took away everything, everything, your essence, your vessel, your mind, your memory, your thoughts, how there had been nothing but Discipline and Wrath, and how you were drowning if it hadn’t been for Dean, Dean still praying, praying to_ him _, his lifeline, his lighthouse in the darkness, the only light in the sea of your brothers’ hatred…_

… Dean dragging him out of the latrine, too many smells, too much darkness, too much pain, and him fighting, struggling, because it couldn’t be gone, it couldn’t be, he couldn’t survive without… Too much. Far too much.


	24. Shifting

**Scene 7 - Shifting**

Cas’s collapse seemed to shift something, though Gabriel found it impossible to pinpoint what it was, exactly. Maybe it was just that their collective downwards spiral had ground to a halt, just for an instance, before they would inevitably all die. There were barely any news from the outside world anymore, and last Gabriel had heard anything, Croatoan had swept through Europe and was well on its way to swallow up Africa and Asia, too. There had been no communication from Australia in a very long time, but Gabe assumed that Lucifer might sink the whole continent just out of spite.

If Gabriel was honest, it hadn’t been just Cas’s collapse. Cas had been doing fine enough, until Gabriel had chosen to obliterate his stash and had nearly killed him. Strangely enough, Dean hadn’t hesitated to go out and find something for Cas, then, to take the edge off the withdrawal. Gabriel wasn’t sure if he’d made it through otherwise, but of course none of this was ever mentioned to Cas. Dean had made Gabe swear as much, even, when Chuck had stitched up his hands. So yes, Gabriel might have snapped, too, that day. Who in their sane mind crushed hypodermics in their bare hands?

Of course, he still had some juice left to heal his injuries, but beyond the absolute necessary, he didn’t bother. He deserved the pain. Cas wasn’t the brother he was setting out to kill.

Thankfully, neither of them spoke of the events ever again. Cas made it through to the other side, and though he started using again, Gabe was sure he had it more under control, now. It wasn’t that he was sober, though sometimes, he came close, but he appeared less frantic, less haunted. Maybe he was just hiding it all better, but at least it felt like they had all three started from a clean slate. Of course, there was something niggling at the back of Gabe’s mind – the fact that his could describe the memory of the event as _vague_ , when everything used to be crystal clear, angelically perfect – but he refused to acknowledge the unease.

Day to day, they gathered to map out hot zones, to try figuring out which of the bigger cities were still on the grid, find out where Lucifer might be. Without the internet, or any sort of nationwide network, really, figuring stuff like that out had become a lot harder. Risa, whom for some reason Dean had decided to take on as second in command, was usually the one who went farther afield and brought back the news. Obviously Cas wasn’t Dean’s lieutenant, and neither was Gabe, though Dean hardly ever did anything anymore without Cas’s… approval was too candid a word. At least, he didn’t do anything Cas wasn’t willing to come along to, which was just as good. Of course, Cas now either manned the car or led the supply squad. He was an excellent fighter, but they did more running than fighting, and Cas was still limping. He probably always would be.

At any rate, Risa hadn’t been invited today. Dean’s best source of information was still torture, and no one was supposed to know about that. It was an open secret, but one they didn’t discuss, as they didn’t discuss Cas’s drugs and Gabe’s spells of irrationality. Dean had finally figured out where the Colt would be taken next. Or so he thought, and he had already sent a team on the way. If all went well –

“If all goes well, in a few days we will kill the Devil,” Dean declared.

“We have to find him first.”

Dean fixed Gabriel with a deathly glare. “You can sense him. You’ve known all along.”

“No, I didn’t. I catch flickers. Impressions. If there’d been anything clear, I would have told you after we’d gotten the rings. The Colt isn’t going to work.”

Dean wasn’t deterred. “We’ve talked about this, Gabe. I’m taking your blade, too. It’s better to kill him than to imprison him again. He is just going to escape.”

Cas sighed, toying with his joint, as yet unlit. “It’s like a play. A tragedy. We’re just waiting for the catastrophe to happen.”

“What is?” Dean asked, gruffly. He was pouring over something – supply lists, Gabriel thought. Had to be supply lists.

“What do you think? Our lives, of course.”

“Our lives are not a play, Cas.”

Cas shrugged, in that way of his that meant ‘I don’t care what you say, fearless leader.’ “It’s depressing, I grant you, but I suppose viewed from the outside it has to be quite engaging. The valiant heroes struggling against insurmountable odds and their inner demons, literal ones, too, sometimes, and yet doomed to failure…” Cas waved his joint in an theatrical ark, bits of weed falling onto Dean’s lists.

 

 


	25. Positioning

**Act V**

**Scene 1 - Positioning**

When Dean’s team returned, they had lost all but three to Croats and demons, but they had the Colt, and that was all that seemed to matter. There was only one bullet left, but Gabriel was sure they wouldn’t have time for more anyway. He still wondered how he could convince Dean to try the rings, first. If that didn’t work, well…

“You have to admit it has a huge flaw. Lucifer will never just walk into the trap, and even then every cage can be broken,” Cas said that night when they shared their meal, picking at the plain bread without much appetite. He never had any, these days.

“We don’t even know if Luci can be killed, Cas.”

“Maybe not with the Colt.” Cas ran his finger along Gabriel’s angel blade, lying on the desk between them. “An archangel’s blade.”

“If Lucifer still qualifies as an angel. Who knows what Hell did to him.”

Cas smirked, still a nasty, cruelly foreign expression. “You would be surprised how like demons our brethren could act without becoming anything less than angels.”

“So you really want Dean to walk up to Lucifer and stab him in the chest?”

“No, but I have no power over Dean’s actions. And I understand that he has to do this himself. Would you rather take his place?”

Gabriel had thought that he had come to terms with having to kill one of his once closest brothers, but now that the actual event was looming above them, he wasn’t so sure. “I still love him, Cas. Is that wrong?”

Cas, who had killed more angels, of his own garrison no less, than Gabriel cared to remember or count, abandoned his meal with a bitter laugh, then fell suddenly, eerily, silent. “No. No, it’s not.”

 

Lying awake at night was no novelty for Gabriel, of course, but that night, thought were shooting through his head too numerous to examine closely, while Cas slept a fitful sleep in the other bed. Gabriel had found that it also had become harder to recall the memories of Heaven, the memories of his eons of existence before he had left there, and the centuries of dithering around Earth, with every month that progressed. Maybe he was, in fact, still Falling. Still becoming more and more human with every passing day, only at a very slow pace. He wondered if the memories would eventually be gone completely. If he would live out a human life, not remembering that he had ever been anything else. He had begun to understand Cas’s urge to document it somehow, even if it was only to the open air and the night sky.

Amnesia might have made killing the Devil a whole lot easier.

 

That night, Gabriel dreamed for the first time in his existence. He was standing on Earth – the young Earth, just after his own creation, staring across the unformed plains and empty oceans, tilting his face into the incessant rain. Not that he could feel its touch – he was a wavelength, he didn’t have solidity, nor did he understand the need for it, then. Gabriel had never dreamed, but he had walked through so many human dreams that he knew what it was. The dream world flickered briefly with the realization, but quickly stabilized, the memory strong and powerful, even if his vision did not stretch as far as the horizon.

“Hello, brother.”

“Luci. I was wondering if you’d turn up.” Gabriel didn’t turn around. He didn’t want to know if Lucifer had appeared in his true form, or in his vessel – or whether his form had become twisted and distorted in Hell. He felt the coldness of the presence of powerful grace, and that was enough.

“Why are you still here, Gabriel?” Lucifer said softly, “You could have gone to Heaven.”

“Nah. Far too attached to this old rock.”

“Then join me. Join me, and we can rebuild it! Surely you don’t imagine you could step into Michael’s shoes?”

“You know, you’re my brother, and I love you, Luci – but you are a great big bag of dicks.”

Gabriel felt the atmosphere change, felt the rage radiating off Lucifer that made him so unangelic, so entirely foreign to him.

“Meet me in Detroit, then.”

 

When Gabriel woke up, he found himself staring at Cas, sitting in the darkness with a glass of absinthe in his shaking hands. “Detroit,” was all he said, and Gabriel knew.

Just like that, they were ready to kill the Devil.


	26. Readying

**Scene 2 - Readying**

They went to Dean immediately after Gabriel snatched the drink from Cas’s hand and swallowed it in one. Alcohol wasn’t usually Gabe’s vice, but Cas sympathized. The encounter with Lucifer had been deeply unsettling. The Devil had regarded Cas like a specimen, something to be examined, nothing more than a bug. He had been wearing Sam Winchester’s face.

Cas had not been able to do anything. He had no power over his dreams, no power over Lucifer. He tried to wrench himself out of the nightmare, but Lucifer had held him captive with nothing but disregard. Cas wondered whether there was even a trace of the Morningstar left. Whether he had been an angel even before his Fall and imprisonment.

And still he had asked him to join him. Cas had laughed in his face, and had finally, finally woken up, but he had known, then. Had known that the time to die had come, and that he was going freely.

Dean wasn’t impressed at being woken – from nightmares he never could remember – but he was alert immediately. “Detroit. You’re sure?”

“Yes,” Gabriel said, his voice uncharacteristically grim.

 

They convened in the common hut barely an hour later, Risa predictable irritable at being woken up. “That’s the plan?”

“Yeah. He’ll know we’re coming.” Dean tapped his hand on the map of the Detroit area spread out between them. “We know the block, the building. This is our chance.”

Cas poured himself a drink. “So you’re saying we, uh, walk in straight up the driveway, past all the demons and the Croats, and we shoot the devil?”

Dean fixed him with a stare. “You’re saying it’s reckless?”

Cas shrugged, picking at his jeans. “If you prefer ‘insouciant’, I could use that.”

Gabriel shifted in his seat. “Look, Dean. We have no idea if the Colt will work. You only got one chance. Try the rings.”

Dean brushed him off, as he had done so often before, his patience wearing thin. “We need to be killing him. Imprisoning him is just putting off the inevitable.”

So was Gabriel’s. “How many times, no one will be able to raise him again!”

“You think.”

Gabriel leant back in his chair, tipping it precariously. “Have it your way.”

“You coming?”

For a moment, Cas almost expected Gabe to say no. There was no question that he would go with Dean, as he always had, but his brother had never felt such loyalty to the human. He was only here because fate had left him no choice. If he had Fallen hundreds of miles away from the camp, who knew whether he would ever have made it back to them. Who knew whether Cas would ever have known that there was another of his brothers on Earth.

Gabriel twirled a toothpick between his fingers. It was a nervous habit he had picked up after it became clear that there were no more lollipops to be had. “You mean even though you’re likely going to get us all killed? You wouldn’t be able to do it without me, Dean-o!”

“That’s settled, then. Risa?”

Risa shifted her gun holster, leaning over the map. “Two parties, set up a distraction at the back and walk in through the front door?”

Dean nodded. “That’s what I’m thinking. The devil will know what’s up, but it should give us enough of a time window to get our shot in.”

Cas rose, finishing off his drink. “I’ll get the grunts moving,” he said, and headed out immediately. He didn’t expect Dean to come after him.

Dean pulled him to a stop by the elbow. “You’re not going, Cas, not all the way. I need you to drive but that’s it.”

“What? Why?”

Dean’s face went dark, his eyes closing off. Cas had seen the look before, too many times. Usually, he was more stoned. “Look at you. You’re a just a crippled junkie. You can’t even walk straight, and it’s the middle of the night and you’re high. You couldn’t hold your own against one Croat, let alone the horde we’re going to encounter. I can’t have any weak links.”

Cas wondered if it had occurred to Dean that he had no intention of surviving, and that, even if they did manage to kill the Devil, which was still a big if, they would all die, anyway. If it wasn’t the Croats or the Demons that killed them, it would be living life in a post-apocalyptic world. Camp Chitaqua had been about survival, not about building a sustainable community on the long run. “And you, fearless leader, barely sleep an hour at night, drown yourself in alcohol when no one is looking, oh and yeah, you’re elbow deep in blood every other day because you vented your anger on a demon if I’m not available. You’re the perfect picture of mental health! Newsflash, Dean! The world has gone to shit, and I’m damned well going to be there when it all ends.”

Dean tore his hand from Cas’s elbow, rather painfully. “Dammit, Cas! I can’t take people who are a fucking liability! This is too important!”

“So you want to face Lucifer alone.”

“Yes, if I have to.”

“Fine.”

“Excuse me?”

“I said, fine. I’m not going to argue this. But I am coming, and I am going to be fighting in the front line. I know you’ll need a distraction. That’s why you’re bringing them.” Cas nodded towards the troops, not seeing people, not anymore. Just flesh and cannon fodder. “You’ll send them in at the front, I know you will. This isn’t about distracting Lucifer, this is about getting all the demons and Croats out of the way. I’ll get that done. And you trust me, still.”

Dean slammed his palm against the door of the car by which they had stopped, but Cas recognized resignation when it presented itself. “First, you’re driving.”


	27. Moving

**Scene 3 - Moving**

Of course, he was sharing a car with Cas. Gabriel had never cared to talk to any of the humans in the camp, apart from maybe Dean and Chuck (and Risa, because he had to), and those he had pranked, flirted with, _toyed_ with, didn’t particularly like him. So, he was stuck with Cas, who nonchalantly swallowed a pill not even an hour into the drive.

“What?”

“Nothing. Keep your eyes on the road.” Such as it was, unmaintained and filled with rubble. Gabriel didn’t like cars. Didn’t trust them, even when he was the one driving. They were unnatural, confining. He felt it less with his diminished grace, but he was still precious cargo, and he couldn’t help thinking that he’d prefer a sober driver. “I’m not so stupid as to ask you to drive sober.”

Cas chuckled, despite knowing how much Gabe hated it when he did that, because it made him sound so… broken. “It’s just amphetamines. To counteract that absinthe.”

“I wish you weren’t coming.”

“Not you fucking too!” Cas punched his palm against the steering wheel, suddenly angry. “I don’t care what happens to me, Gabe! We have this one chance at stopping Lucifer, and I will not sit back and twiddle my thumbs. Go out in a blaze of glory, eh?”

The anger had evaporated as quickly as it had come, and Cas was just smiling grimly. Gabriel fidgeted in his seat, wishing he had brought something to play with. Even his blade was with Dean. “You’re still doing it for Dean.”

“None of your business.”

“Cas, what if I asked you, as your brother, to stay out of it. To survive.”

“Survive? What for? I mean, Gabe, look at me! I’m all but useless! My foot never healed properly and I’m only getting out of bed because of these!” He shook the pill bottle, the remaining ones rattling inside. “At least you have a semblance of your grace left! I’m not an angel anymore, Gabe, and I suck at being human. I’m sorry, but I don’t want to live like this. I should have stopped all this. I should have saved Sam. I should have taken better care of Dean. If my death is what it takes to make amends, I’ll do it. That’s the mission, now, and I expect you to be in the front line with me.”

Gabriel pouted. “You thought I wouldn’t be?”

Cas glanced at him, briefly. “I never know what you think, whose side you’re on. I don’t think you will betray us, but if you do, I will stop you.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence, Cas.”

“Gabe–”

“Nah, I get it. I’ll fight at your side, lil’ bro, never fear.”

Cas gave a curt nod, and they lapsed back into silence. The drive was going to be long, too long to rile each other up. When he was sure Cas wasn’t looking, Gabe slipped his hand into the pocket of his jacket, tracing the outlines of the four rings magically bound together he had concealed there. He hadn’t told Cas. Or Dean. But if the Colt didn’t work, if the blade didn’t work, they needed to have a Plan C. Dean might not believe him, might not believe that it was even possible to get Lucifer into the cage, and neither might Cas, but frankly Gabriel had the same doubts about the Colt and his blade. It was worth having the rings around as backup, anyway, and Gabriel was the least likely to get killed, so it was only natural that he should have them. He still felt bad about not telling Cas.

With the deplorable road conditions, it took them almost a day to get to Detroit. They camped just outside the city where the traces of hasty evacuation were still visible, settling down for the night before they would walk right in with the first daylight. Neither Gabe nor Cas got any sleep that night – they didn’t want to give Lucifer the opportunity to find out they were there, if he hadn’t already sensed them.

Detroit was unusually cold for August, even freezing at night, and if they needed any other proof of Lucifer’s presence, it was that. Cas and Gabe waited out the sunrise on the hood of their car, breathing in the still, cold air. Cas was quiet and soberer than he had been in years, and Gabriel felt a strange calm. It was a nice sunrise, even, the moment solemn and beautiful. Dean was there, too, though he kept his distance from them, sitting in his car and staring at the growing light.

Then, when the twilight had passed, he climbed out, slamming his door, and they were on the move again.

No one stopped them on their way into the city, no one walked over them as they stopped just outside the compound of buildings Lucifer had chosen. But then, Croats tended to cluster in buildings, emerging only when they sensed prey or were disturbed. The complex was an old Sanatorium, seemingly abandoned now, looking sufficiently, classical-horror-movie creepy. Gabriel could just about appreciate the irony as he crouched next to Cas, waiting for Dean to spy out the building with his binoculars.

“There. Second floor window. There’s a fire escape. We go in there.” Dean didn’t pass the binoculars on to Risa, as he normally would. Instead, he gave them to Cas, who put them into his lap without a word, checking the clip of his gun. He also carried a dagger, as did Gabe, in replacement of his angel blade. Guns might be handy, but they were still better trained in hand-to-hand combat. Croats didn’t carry weapons, anyway.

Risa frowned. “You sure about this?”

Dean sounded it. “Trust me. They’ll never see you coming. They’ll be distracted.”

“You’re leading the distraction? That wise?”

Whether or not Risa really believed the lie, Dean was selling it, his expression perfectly impenetrable, as determined as they had come to expect. “It’s not up for discussion. Weapons check. We move in five.”

Gabriel hefted the dagger in his hand, listening to the sound of guns being cocked all around them, an eerie disruption of the silence. “This is it, then,” he said, looking at Cas – but Cas wasn’t seeing him. His eyes were on Dean.

The Croats found them immediately. They had barely moved down the corridor when they were jumped, a whole nest of them. After that, everything was chaos. Gabriel knew that, around them, people were dying, screams and gunfire undistinguishable, but his world had narrowed down to his dagger and Cas, by his side, then back to back, fighting as if they always had – side by side, perfectly coordinated, a garrison of two.

He almost slipped, tripped over something – a corpse, blood – but Cas was there to catch him, and around them, humans were dying. The Croats still kept coming, but they were still fighting, and maybe he was bleeding this time, and blood splattered, and so was Cas, but they weren’t backing away. They weren’t advancing over corpses, Croats and grunts from the camp, and the Croats weren’t pushing them back – yet.

Suddenly, Cas stumbled, his infirm foot going right out from under him.

 

 

 


	28. Ending

**Scene 4 - Ending**

“No…” Cas’s broken whisper told Gabe everything he needed to know. He wrenched his frozen brother back from the fray, shepherding him into an alcove while the battle raged around them. Not that it would for much longer. Lucifer was still there, and the fact that Cas went without resistance, and allowed Gabe to pry the gun and dagger from his fingers, told the rest.

“Cas! Hey!” Gabriel patted his cheek. “Look at me!”

Cas’s eyes found his and suddenly he was clinging to Gabriel with all his force, a lost, frightened fledgling once more, the residue of his grace, so out of reach to Cas himself, straining to connect with Gabe’s. “He’s dead. He’s dead. He’s dead.”

“I know. Cassie, I know. I’m sorry.” Gabriel wasn’t sure when ‘Cassie’ had become a term of endearment instead of something to wind Cas up with, and it was late, way too late for that kind of realization. Gabe patted his brother’s back awkwardly. “Our turn. Lucifer will know we’re here by now.”

Cas only clung tighter, saying nothing, but Gabriel could hear the mantra still.

“Now, Castiel, while the Croats are still distracted.”

Cas flinched at the use of his full name, pushing back against Gabe with rage. “How _dare_ you!”

“Look, we don’t have time for this shit, brother! Lucifer will be basking in his victory, relaxed. If there was ever a chance of getting through to Sam, it will be now!”

“Fuck you!”

“Cas-”

“I was ready to _die_ , Gabriel! I was ready to die! I always knew it would end here, and I thought that if we could just give Dean enough time – but you planned this all along. You made him walk to his death! You let _me_ walk into this, thinking–!”

“How can you still defend him! He sent you into the fray without a second thought! He hated you in the end, Cas! He hated you!”

“ _I don’t care!_ ”

“Then help me make his death mean _something_! I can’t do this without you, lil’ bro!”

Castiel snatched his gun from Gabe’s hold, his jaw set. He looked suddenly more like the angel, like the soldier that was now a distant memory to them both , than he ever had since his Fall from grace. “Go. I’ll buy you the time you need.”

Gabriel nodded and pulled the last of his grace together for flight. One last trick.

 

Castiel made his way to the garden unhindered. He didn’t know where he found the strength, or the determination, didn’t notice how both Croats and demons parted to let him pass, cowed by angelic wrath not unlike Lucifer’s, but so much more emotional, so much more _human_.

The garden held a desolate beauty, untouched wilderness reclaiming a once human domain, feral and untamed, and a dark, twisted parody of _the_ Garden, Paradise. The rose bushes, pricking with thorns, caught on his trousers, ripping a deep gash into his shin he barely even noticed. This wasn’t his Father’s creation, not anymore. Everything Lucifer had touched had become corrupt, and the corpse at the heart of the garden was testimony to that.

Castiel could sense Lucifer – so close by, the only archangel still in full power was a force disrupting the flow of nature even a human couldn’t ignore – but he was out of sight, as yet. He wouldn’t remain so for very long.

Cas knelt down by Dean’s side. Even in death, even with his neck broken, Dean still looked defiant. Cas traced the lines of his face, mapping them out with shaking fingers for one last time, as if he needed to commit them to memory. As if they hadn’t been seared into his mind long ago, in endless variations. Twisted with rage, with grief, with fear, with arrogance and deviance, and, in a place deep in Cas’s memory, with smiles, with laughter, mirth.

Cas cupped Dean’s face in both his hands, pressing their foreheads together. It was useless to will Dean’s eyes to open, to look into their once green depths and will the light of his pure soul to return to them. Cas reached inside and tore, seizing the flicker of grace he had long since given up trying to reach and violently wrenched it out, pouring it into Dean. Cleansing, repairing, mending. He couldn’t restore life. It was too late, far too late for that, but he was still an angel, and he could still bestow final rites. Hell had no right to Dean, and if Heaven was gone, it was better that Dean’s soul should dwell in nature. Hell _had no right_.

Around them, the garden was changing, but Cas was too tired. Too tired to feel the soft grass, or see the thornbushes retreating, flowers springing up in a circle around them, a little sapling pricking through the earth and growing, too fast, just next to them. He was too tired to hear birdsong starting up above the cacophony of the battle in the distance.

“Castiel. I should have known.”

Castiel looked up at Lucifer, regarding him with placid compassion. He hadn’t been aware that he’d been crying, but he didn’t feel shame. “You had no right to his soul.”

“Of course not.” The Morningstar folded his hands loosely, looking apologetic. “I’m sorry it had to come to this, brother.”

“No. You don’t know what that means. You will never know what it is to feel sorry, to feel pain and regret. You will never know what it feels like to _love_ because that is _human_!” Castiel hurled the words into Lucifer’s face.

He immediately found himself flung against the sapling with just a flick of Lucifer’s wrist, its leaves rustling at the impact, but it was built from sturdier stuff than Cas’s rips. He pushed himself up off the ground, shaking, and spit out blood.

“Insolent seraph! I _loved_ my Father! I loved him, more than anyone of you!”

“No, you didn’t. Your ‘love’ for our Father was nothing but mindless devotion. If you had really _loved_ , Lucifer, you would have found it in yourself to love his creations, as he asked of you. You never understood.”

Lucifer’s grace closed around Cas’s windpipe, an incorporal hand, and Cas choked, trying and failing to draw breath. “Sam… understood…”

The hand was gone, and Cas draw in a shuddering breath. “Sam always understood. He made mistakes, but he loves Dean. He loves him, truly, and in a way you could never understand. It was that love that drove him to you, not hatred. He was trying to stop you, you know. And you don’t even allow him to grieve for his _brother_!” Cas spat out – more blood. He was running out of time. “Sam… I’m sorry. I should have protected Dean better, but I failed. I can’t make this right. I can never make this right, but maybe you can.”

“Cas?”

Cas looked up, blinking against the bright sun and Lucifer’s white suit, but the face looking down at him was Sam’s. “I am so sorry.”

 

Gabriel could have felt Lucifer’s rage a mile off, but it was good. The Morningstar was distracted completely; he didn’t even notice Gabriel’s approach. He winced inwardly as Castiel was flung against the tree, fiddling with the rings. He had to do this right, and it was now or never. He only had one try.

Gabriel flung the rings to the ground at the same time as Lucifer dropped his hand – not Lucifer, Sam, now, his eyes glistening.

Gabriel yelled the spell above the roar of the portal opening. “Now, Sam! You have to jump now!”

Sam turned around slowly, but didn’t move. His face was twisted into a grimace.

“Now!”

Suddenly, Castiel was back on his feet, his hand closing around Sam’s shoulder before he looked at Gabriel, determination shining in his eyes.

“No! Cassie, no!”

“I’m sorry, Gabriel!” And then, with a tug and a shove, they were both falling.

The portal snapped shut behind them, and everything was silent.

 


	29. Revelation

**Coda - Revelation**

There was a human saying – that the world ended with a whimper, not a bang. Perhaps the world hadn’t ended. Not yet. Gabriel could still hear the whimper. He thought that, maybe, when it stopped, it would all be over.

Five months ago, he’d thought it would all be over by the next day. He thought that, even if Dean failed, he would be able to trap Lucifer, shove him back into the cage, and all would be well.

All that had happened. Dean had failed, and Lucifer was back in the cage, and nothing was well. They were all gone, now. The angels, Sam, Dean – and Castiel. Of course, the humans were still around. Gabriel had to give them that, they were resilient. With Lucifer gone, the demons had scampered, and the Croats – well, some had just died, and others went back to being human, with no memory of what had happened. In the last five months, Gabriel had witnessed communities forming, communication networks coming back online, society being rebuild.

He was as good as human, now, too. His grace had burned out in that last flight, and Gabe liked to think that the hollow ache in his chest was because of that, but it all felt too familiar. Again, he was wandering Earth, not really stopping or belonging anywhere. He took the first flight out of the US, visited Iceland, and eventually came back. Detroit had been abandoned, declared a no-go zone. Even after all they had witnessed, humans still found the fast growing, heartbreakingly beautiful garden that was spreading out all over the city from its nucleus at the old sanatorium disturbing. Gabriel spent a long time there. He thought he could feel Cas, there, even though he could no longer sense grace. Or maybe he could, and he was just deluding himself into thinking that any of the last brother he had ever felt close to was left.

Eventually, he moved on, trying to find a purpose elsewhere. Of course, there was also the fact that his memory was still slipping. Already, he was struggling to remember the names of some of his brothers and sisters. Cas’s old commander, what had her name been? And the other archangel, the one with a gift for healing and no sense of humor? Gabriel was sure that, one day, he would wake up and not remember why he was feeling so sad. He dreaded that day, but drugs weren’t his vice. That had all been Cas.

So, instead, he wandered. Maybe, he would finally settle down somewhere, or someone would take him in. But he was sure that, eventually, he would return to Detroit.

**Author's Note:**

> Re: the major character death. Think "Swan Song"+"The End" for the ending. Gabriel is not one of the deaths. Also there are characters that canonically die in either "The End" or in S05, such as the pagan gods, the Horsemen and Bobby, which also happens in this fic.


End file.
